Another possible limitation is that we discuss our OXTR SNP score in terms of low-versus high-risk, in part to align our work with current cGxE frameworks. Understanding the relationship among OXTR, oxytocin, and behavior is a work in progress. Given what appears to be the highly contextual nature of oxytocin’s relationship to behavioral outcomes, the label “risk” may be less accurate than “affiliative tendency.” Hopefully in the future we will have a better understanding of and label for OXTR gene variation. Because they are often longitudinal and focus on measuring experiences and processes in the social domains through which interventions are designed to work, such as via parent-child and peer-youth relationships, preventative intervention data sets might prove especially valuable for uncovering how OXTR variation, as well as variation in other genes and sets of genes, affects social processes. Kurt Lewin’s phrase, “If you want truly to understand something, try to change it”, is often mentioned by prevention researchers to underscore the implications of interventions for understanding the etiology of the behaviors they are trying to change. It seems that this phrase is equally applicable to the advantage of intervention for trying to understand how and why specific genes impact behaviors.
