Just thinking you have poor endurance genes changes your body
By Jocelyn Kaiser,
Science
| 12. 10. 2018
If you want to win a race or stick to a difficult diet, coaches of all kinds will tell you it’s all about “mind over matter.” But that advice rarely crosses over into the medical community, where an inborn ability—or risk—is thought to depend more on genes and environment than on mindset. Now, in a study examining what may be a novel form of the placebo response, psychologists have found that just telling a person they have a high or low genetic risk for certain physical traits can influence how their body functions when exercising or eating, regardless of what genetic variant they actually have.
The results could be an eye-opener for medical providers and consumer DNA testing companies. “From a psychological science perspective, it’s not terribly surprising that genetic risk information can function this way,” says behavioral researcher Susan Persky of the National Human Genome Research Institute in Bethesda, Maryland, who was not involved in the study. But it’s a novel idea in the genetics community, she adds.
After getting ethics approval to conduct an experiment that involved deceiving...
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The Center for Genetics and Society is delighted to recommend the current edition of GMWatch Review – Number 589. UK-based GMWatch, a long-standing ally, was founded in 1998 by Jonathan Matthews as an independent organization seeking to counter the enormous corporate political power and propaganda of the GMO industry and its supporters. Matthews and Claire Robinson are its directors and managing editors.
CGS works to ensure that social justice, equity, human rights, and democratic governance are front...