Does this mean that research on genetics has no place in the study of racial disparities in health? We think not. Instead, we call for more research on the potential contribution of genetics to population health and provide broad guidelines for the needed research that seeks to understand how social exposures combine with biology to affect patterns of disease. Race remains an important social category in contemporary society.1 It is strongly related to many environmental factors and racial groups are likely to differ on a broad range of environmental risks and exposures. Given the extent to which a broad range of social, behavioral, nutritional, psychological, residential, occupational and other variables vary by race, race is a crude category that likely reflects simultaneous confounding for unmeasured genetic and environmental factors.137 Given that biology is not static but is adaptive to the environmental conditions in which the human organism exists, it is important for research to assess potential interactions between the social environment and both innate and acquired biological factors.
