Inheritable genetic changes can help shape the mental health of coming generations
THROUGHOUT human history, people have realised that many illnesses are “in the blood”.
More recently, we have established that there is a genetic contribution to psychiatric diseases too. The extent to which the environment acts with our genes to cause illness is still under study, however.
An even bigger question is whether the environment can cause inheritable “epigenetic” changes. These wouldn’t alter the sequence of your DNA one jot but instead leave chemical marks on genes that dictate how active they are, not just in you but in…
