Episcopal Bishop still the only “Gay Gene”
Why Some Men Are Gay; Mystery Solved? Not so fast…
Scientists at the University of California at Los Angeles would like people to believe that there is a “gay gene”. They say that they “have found that the genetics of mothers who have multiple gay sons act differently than those of other women.”
The research “confirms that there is a strong genetic basis for sexual orientation, and that for some gay men, genes on the X chromosome are involved,” said study co-author Sven Bocklandt, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California at Los Angeles.
But, it seems that the study far from “confirms” such a thing.
. Dr. Ionel Sandovici, a genetics researcher at The Babraham Institute in Cambridge, England, pointed out that most of the mothers of multiple gay sons didn’t share the unusual X-chromosome trait. And the study itself is small, which means more research will need to be done to confirm its findings, Sandovici said.
Ultimately, Sandovici added, the origins of sexual orientation remain “rather a complicated biological puzzle.”
In other words, there’s nothing new been discovered. In the study, there was virtually no difference between mothers who had one gay son and mothers who have no gay sons:
[Four] percent of mothers with no gay sons activated the chromosome and 13 percent of those with just one gay son did.
That means that there were 6 women with one gay son who activated the same chromosome and 4 women with no gay sons who did. There is something to be said about the fact that 11 of the women with more than one gay son activated that same chromosome … but it certainly isn’t a discovery that supports the conclusion of the scientists.
Matt, while I agree that this study does not prove anything, the difference of 4% of mothers in the one sample (no gay sons) and 13% (one gay son) in the other is statistically significantant. Also in the group of mothers that had two or more gay sons this factor went up to 23%. Why did you leave that part out?
While this data alone is by no means conclusive proof that homosexuality is caused by purely genetic factors, it is does suggest that there may be genetic factors involved in homosexuality.
The abstract to the article in question can be found at http://www.springerlink.com/link.asp?id=p2365262023tkn31
JayBee said this on February 25th, 2006 at 1:12 am
I did include the statistics for mothers of more than one gay son … noting 11 women in this category inactivating the chromosome. (The abstract you link to actually says 10 — I arrived at 11 by taking the percentage of the 44 and rounding up.)
When percentages are used, it appears to be more significant: 4% vs 13% vs 23%. But, the actual numbers are less significant: 4 (103 * 0.04) vs 7 (53 * 0.13) vs 10 (44 * 0.23).
The study really is not as significant as its being reported. I think what a study with such an insignificant sample size may do is actually create more divisiveness and contention in the issue, as well as a bias in future research because of such contention.
Matt said this on February 26th, 2006 at 10:18 am