We use a sample of adolescent twins in our study. By using an adolescent twin sample we are able to assess the role of adolescent’s genes in their experiences of parental negativity and life events. During adolescence the environment exerts considerable influence on development at the same time as the individual begins to exert influence on their environment. As such adolescence is an ideal developmental period in which to study genetic involvement in environmental exposure. To our knowledge this is the first attempt to entirely account for the heritability of putative environmental measures via their association with multiple behavioural phenotypes.
