Genetic and environmental influences on nutrient intake

Genes & Nutrition

Table 1 A summary of previous studies examining genetic and environmental influences on energy and macronutrient

Author	Sample	Age	Method	Gender	Energy intake			Macronutrient intake
					Energy intake			Carbohydrate			Fat			Protein
					A	C(D)	E	A	C(D)	E	A	C(D)	E	A	C(D)	E
Hasselbalch et al. (2008)	n = 1,212 Denmark	18–67 \( \bar{x} \) = 38	FFQ	Males	0.38	–	0.62	0.36^a	–	0.64	0.01 ns	(0.36)	0.63	0.28^a	–	0.72
				Females	0.32	–	0.68	0.49^a	–	0.51	0.01 ns	(0.43)	0.56	0.01 ns	(0.55^a)	0.44
Hur et al. (1998)	n = 335 USA/UK	18–77 \( \bar{x} \) = 42.4	FFQ	Male + female	0.32	–	0.68	0.25	–	0.75	0.35	–	0.65	0.16 ns	–	0.84
								0.24 ns SC	–	0.76	0.37 Sat	–	0.63
								0.18 ns CC	–	0.82	0.46 Poly	–	0.54
Wade et al. (1981)^d	n = 46 Canada	19–58 \( \bar{x} \) = 39.2	3-day food diary	Female	0.11 ns			0.66			–^b			0.20
								0.67^a			0.48^a			0.70^a
Heller et al. (1988)^d	n = 400 Australia	17–66 \( \bar{x} \) = 36	4-day food diary	Male + female	0.38 ns (0.27)			0.31 ns (0.36)			0.24 ns (0.16)			0.08 ns (−0.13)
								0.20 SC			0.10 SF
								0.55 CC			0.33 MF
											0.03 PF
de Castro et al. (1993)	n = 390 USA	\( \bar{x} \) = 38.8	7-day food diary	Male + female	0.65	–	0.35	0.61	–	0.39	0.57	–	0.43	0.50	–	0.50
Faith et al. (1999)	n = 108 USA	>18	2 buffet lunches in lab session	Male + female	0.33	0.48^c ns	0.19^c

Macronutrient intakes are reported as absolute daily intake, unless denoted with “a” for calculation as concentration
A additive genetic effect, D non-additive genetic effect, C shared environment effect, E non-shared environment effect, FFQ food frequency questionnaire, SC simple carbohydrate, CC complex carbohydrate, SF saturated fat, MF monounsaturated fat, PF polyunsaturated fat, ns nonsignificant
^bHeritability of fat intake in grams was not calculated because MZ within-pair mean square exceeded DZ value
^cDaily caloric intake only
^dHeritability estimates were based on either Holzingers’ H equation [(Variance DZ−Variance MZ)/Variance DZ] or Falconer equation [2(rMZ−rDZ)]; C and E estimates were not provided. Heller et al. also estimated the heritability as the ratio of the genetic variance to the total variance; estimates are presented in the parentheses

ISSN: 1865-3499