Study: Serotonin Gene Not Linked To Depression
This is kind of major: a new study out today in JAMA asserts that an earlier 2003 study that claimed to identify the single gene 5-HTTLPR (a serotonin transporter) as the prime driver of depression is in fact wrong. In the new study authors claim “meta-analysis yielded no evidence that the serotonin transporter genotype alone or in interaction with stressful life events is associated with an elevated risk of depression in men alone, women alone, or in both sexes combined.”
Stressful life events, however, were significantly linked to depression.
That may sound ever so basic to many readers, but when the 2003 study came out it got a ton of attention, as the New York Times reports today, and spread the “it’s in the genes” hypothesis of depression far and wide and also boosted the chemical imbalance theory of depression in the bargain.
“The authors conclude that the widespread acceptance of the original findings was premature, writing that ‘it is critical that health practitioners and scientists in other disciplines recognize the importance of replication of such findings before they can serve as valid indicators of disease risk’ or otherwise change practice.
“Dr. Caspi and other psychiatric researchers said it would be equally premature to abandon research into gene-environment interaction, when brain imaging and other kinds of evidence have linked the serotonin gene to stress sensitivity.
“‘This is an excellent review paper, no one is questioning that,’ said Myrna Weissman, a professor of epidemiology and psychiatry at Columbia. ‘But it ignored extensive evidence from humans and animals linking excessive sensitivity to stress” to the serotonin gene.’”
Obviously, this new finding is going to be debated hotly for some time to come, but at a minimum it strikes a serious blow to genetic/brain chemistry advocates in the land and, hopefully, shifts debates about depression causes back to where they properly belong–environment, human development, stress and, gasp, human psychology.
If I may pat myself–and many readers–on the back for a moment, this new finding is also a small validation of what I have been saying on this site for four years: that evidence for genetics and neurochemistry as drivers of depression and other mental disorders were in fact weak and that using them to displace considerations of environment, etc. was buying us all a lot of trouble especially since the newish theories weren’t proving out over time. Some people derided me as a kook for saying so.
I wonder who the kooks are now.
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