A research team exploring how genes and environmental factors interact in psychiatry has discovered that a history of sexual trauma and a genetic tendency to develop mental illness are associated with increased risk for schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and major depression. The findings, reported Oct 30 in the journal JAMA Psychiatry , highlight the importance of evaluating the contributions of social and environmental risk factors in human genetic studies and emphasize the need for routine screening of sexual trauma in clinical settings . "Evaluating how genetic risk interacts with environmental risk factors such as sexual trauma is important for understanding how mental illness develops and identifying high-risk groups for early intervention," said Allison Lake, an MD/Ph.
D. student at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine and co-corresponding and first author of the study. The investigators found that polygenic scores —estimates of a person's genetic predisposition for a specific disease—for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder had weaker associations with mental health outcomes in individuals who reported sexual trauma.
"Our study suggests that schizophrenia and bipolar disorder polygenic scores generated using existing methods may be less predictive in the context of sexual trauma," Lake said. "As polygenic scores are being considered for use in clinical settings, our findings demonstrate the importance of expanding clinical screening efforts for trauma and other envi.