Is There a “Gay Gene"? | Psychology Today

Contents:

• WHAT DO THE NEW ‘GAY GEN’ TELL ABOUT SEXUAL ORIENTATN?
• SEARCH FOR 'GAY GEN' COM UP SHORT IN LARGE NEW STUDY
• THERE IS NO ‘GAY GENE.’ THERE IS NO ‘STRAIGHT GENE.’ SEXUALY IS JT PLEX, STUDY NFIRMS
• WHY ARE PEOPLE GAY? GAY BY CHOICE OR IS BEG GAY GEIC?
• THERE’S (STILL) NO GAY GENE
• THE 'GAY GENE' IS A MYTH BUT BEG GAY IS 'NATURAL,' SAY SCIENTISTS
• NO ‘GAY GENE’: MASSIVE STUDY HOM ON GEIC BASIS OF HUMAN SEXUALY
• MANY GEN INFLUENCE SAME-SEX SEXUALY, NOT A SGLE ‘GAY GENE’
• THE LIFE OF THE GAY GENE: OM HYPOTHETIL GEIC MARKER TO SOCIAL REALY
• THERE’S NO ONE ‘GAY GENE,’ BUT GEICS ARE LKED TO SAME-SEX BEHAVR, NEW STUDY SAYS
• 'GAY GEN': SCIENCE IS ON THE RIGHT TRACK, WE'RE BORN THIS WAY. LET’S AL WH .
• IS THERE A 'GAY GENE'? THE PROBLEM WH STUDI NNECTG GEICS AND LGBTQ INTY
• IS THERE A “GAY GENE"?
• THE 'GAY GENE' IS A TOTAL MYTH, MASSIVE STUDY CONCLUS

WHAT DO THE NEW ‘GAY GEN’ TELL ABOUT SEXUAL ORIENTATN?

We have known for s that sexual orientatn is partly herable men, thanks to studi of fai which some people are straight and some people are gay.

In 1993, geic variatns a regn on the X chromosome men were lked to whether they were heterosexual or homosexual, and 1995, a regn on chromosome 8 was intified. Grave’s disease is more mon gay than straight men, and some rearch suggts that gay men tend to be thner – which might possibly be a rult of thyroid overdrive. There have been studi suggtg that there is a geic element to homosexualy women, but more rearch has been done men, says Sanrs.

SEARCH FOR 'GAY GEN' COM UP SHORT IN LARGE NEW STUDY

The latt fdgs open the prospect to intifyg the whole pathway of gen volved both homosexual and heterosexual orientatn, says Dean Hamer at the US Natnal Instut of Health, who led the study that ppoted chromosome X back 1993. In theory, humans and other animals who are exclively attracted to others of the same sex should be unlikely to produce many blogil children, so any gen that predispose people to homosexualy would rarely be passed on to future generatns. Yet same-sex attractn is wispread humans, and rearch suggts that is partly a study of data om hundreds of thoands of people, rearchers have now intified geic patterns that uld be associated wh homosexual behavur, and showed how the might also help people to fd different-sex mat, and reproduce.

The thors say their fdgs, published on 23 Augt Nature Human Behavur1, uld help to expla why gen that predispose people to homosexualy ntue to be passed down. None of the variatns seemed to greatly affect sexual behavur on s own, backg up prev rearch that has found no sign of a ‘gay gene’.

THERE IS NO ‘GAY GENE.’ THERE IS NO ‘STRAIGHT GENE.’ SEXUALY IS JT PLEX, STUDY NFIRMS

Most of the participants were born durg a time when homosexualy was eher illegal or culturally taboo their untri, so many people who were attracted to others of the same sex might never have actually acted on their attractn, and uld therefore have end up the wrong group the Monk, an elogist and evolutnary blogist at Yale Universy New Haven, Connecticut, thks that the veats are so important that the paper n’t draw any real nclns about geics and sexual orientatn.

Instead, he thks the rearchers have found geic markers associated wh openns to new experienc, which uld expla the overlap between people who have had a homosexual partner and heterosexual people who have had many partners. And he adms that g a sgle homosexual experience as an ditn of sexual orientatn isn’t ial, but says that the UK Bbank didn’t provi data on attractn.

However, blogists have documented homosexual behavr more than 450 speci, argug that same-sex behavr is not an unnatural choice, and may fact play a val role wh populatns. The 2019 study is the latt a hunt for “gay gen” that began 1993, when Dean Hamer lked male homosexualy to a sectn of the X chromosome. As the ease and affordabily of genome sequencg creased, addnal gene ndidat have emerged wh potential lks to homosexual behavr.

WHY ARE PEOPLE GAY? GAY BY CHOICE OR IS BEG GAY GEIC?

So-lled genome-wi associatn studi intified a gene lled SLITRK6, which is active a bra regn lled the diencephalon that differs size between people who are homosexual or heterosexual.

” For example, certa gen women help crease their fertily, but if the gen are exprsed a male, they predispose him toward homosexualy. While there is no sgle “gay gene, ” there is overwhelmg evince of a blogil basis for sexual orientatn that is programmed to the bra before birth based on a mix of geics and prenatal ndns, none of which the fet choos. And bee the rearchers didn't fd gene variants that rrelated wh a gradient of sexual behavr, she says, unrcuts Aled Ksey's s-old sle, which ranked people on a spectm of sexualy, om exclively heterosexual to exclively homosexual.

THERE’S (STILL) NO GAY GENE

It is worth keepg md that this study only vers some typ of sexualy — gay, lbian and cis-straight — but don’t offer many sights to genr inty. Humans have tried to unrstand human sexualy for centuri — and geics rearchers joed the ay the early 1990s after a seri of studi on tws suggted homosexualy ran fai. “As a teenager tryg to unrstand myself and unrstand my sexualy, I looked at the ter for “the gay gene” and obvly me across Xq28, ” said Fah Sathirapongsasuti, a study -thor and senr scientist at 23andMe, which he joked once led him to believe he hered his gayns om his mother.

“We worried a lot about volunteer bias, ” said Bailey, whose rearch clus a wily publicized study on Xq28 and gay brothers om 2018. The rearchers had members of the same-sex muny review the study’s sign and language, and they adm that their termology and fns for gay, lbian and heterosexual do not reflect the full nature of the sexualy ntuum. “[Our study] unrsr an important role for the environment shapg human sexual behavr and perhaps most importantly there is no sgle gay gene but rather the ntributn of many small geic effects sttered across the genome, ” Neale said.

THE 'GAY GENE' IS A MYTH BUT BEG GAY IS 'NATURAL,' SAY SCIENTISTS

Those who nsir beg gay a disadvantage life (which still is, certa societi), might regard gay people differently if they knew that beg gay was an hered tra, rather than a nsequence of life events, such as a particular type of upbrgg, or mixg wh certa sorts of iends or even a liberate cisn.

NO ‘GAY GENE’: MASSIVE STUDY HOM ON GEIC BASIS OF HUMAN SEXUALY

An early study claimed that if one pair of (male) intil tws (who have intil geic patterns) was gay, there was a 100 percent chance of the other one also beg gay. It was quickly shown that, fact, the real chance of two intil tws beg gay was around 40-50 percent, whereas was ls non-intil on, though still somewhat greater than the general populatn. There was another, much smaller, group who said they were entirely gay (about 6 percent), and a stterg of even smaller numbers who claimed to be bisexual.

MANY GEN INFLUENCE SAME-SEX SEXUALY, NOT A SGLE ‘GAY GENE’

In other words, 5-10% of people experience same-sex sexual attractn or behavr; of urse, this don't speak to what mak people gay. It very much appears that same-sex sexual attractn is not a choice but actg on is; so if you fe gay as the mere prence of same-sex attractn, then om everythg we unrstand, beg gay is not a choice.

THE LIFE OF THE GAY GENE: OM HYPOTHETIL GEIC MARKER TO SOCIAL REALY

If, on the other hand, you nsir someone to be gay only if they act on their same-sex attractn then beg gay n be nsired a choice pendg on an dividual's behavr.

Whether science n ultimately prove the blogy of beg gay or not, 's important to support all adults their choic no matter how they intify. There is no one gene for beg gay, and though gen seem to play a role termg sexual orientatn and same-sex behavr, ’s small, plex, and anythg but termistic.

“We know that smell has a strong tie to sexual attractn, but s lks to sexual behavrs are not clear, ” said -thor Andrea Ganna, an stctor at HMS and Massachetts General Hospal om the Instute for Molecular Medice study is part a rponse to gay, lbian, and bisexual people’s cursy about themselv, said Fah Sathirapongsasuti, a senr scientist at 23andMe and -thor on the study, who is himself gay. Michael Bronski, profsor of the practice media and activism wh the mtee on studi of women, genr, and sexualy, and thor of A Queer History of the Uned Stat, says the allure of a “gay gene” grew om the flourishg gay-rights movement the after the Stonewall rts 1969.

THERE’S NO ONE ‘GAY GENE,’ BUT GEICS ARE LKED TO SAME-SEX BEHAVR, NEW STUDY SAYS

Conservative opponents of the movement claimed that “homosexual acts are a choice, people choose to m them, or people are sced to the gay liftyle, ” he explas. ’77, then a rearcher at the Natnal Instut of Health, published rults showg a rrelatn between male homosexual behavr and a clter of gen, lled Xq28, at the tip of the X chromosome.

Exactly which gene this clter may be volved has proven elive—the current study found no signifint associatn between the X chromosome and same-sex sexual behavr—but the ia that a “gay gene” might lie somewhere Xq28—or elsewhere—was ptivatg.

Zeke Stok, chief programs officer of the LGBTQ advocy anizatn GLAAD, ncurred an emailed statement: “This new study provis even more evince that beg gay or lbian is a natural part of human life, a ncln that has been drawn by rearchers and scientists time and aga.

'GAY GEN': SCIENCE IS ON THE RIGHT TRACK, WE'RE BORN THIS WAY. LET’S AL WH .

Others have warned that the search for a geic e would pathologize homosexualy the same way psychology did the twentieth century: efforts by psychoanalysts such as Irvg Bieber led to the cln of homosexualy the Amerin Psychiatric Associatn’s Diagnostic and Statistil Manual of Mental Disorrs until 1972. As noted above, the gen that rrelated wh same-sex sexual behavr also rrelated wh willgns to take risks, a nnectn that might not hold up cultur where homosexualy is ls stigmatized and those who are ls risk tolerant would therefore feel more able to act openly.

The news this week that the largt study of s kd failed to nfirm the existence of a "gay gene" is not so much a disappotment for those lookg to unrstand the LGBTQ muny, as is an acknowledgement that science do not need to tell what should be plaly obv: gays, lbians, bisexuals and pansexuals are who they are. But here's the quote that will light opponents of LGBTQ rights, some of whom sist they n "nvert" gay people to choose to be straight by prayg the gay away:. "There is no ‘gay gene’ that term whether someone has same-sex partners, ” said Ganna, who is also a geicist at the Broad Instute of MIT and Harvard as well as the Universy of Helski.

IS THERE A 'GAY GENE'? THE PROBLEM WH STUDI NNECTG GEICS AND LGBTQ INTY

While the variatns the gen are not enough to raise a rabow flag and label anyone as unqutnably gay, the rearchers say the blogil variants may at the very least partly fluence sexual behavr. This new rearch, he said “provis even more evince that beg gay or lbian is a natural part of human life, a ncln that has been drawn by rearchers and scientists time and aga. This new rearch also renfirms the long tablished unrstandg that there is no nclive gree to which nature or nurture fluence how a gay or lbian person behav.

Geics nnot tell "the whole story, " as Eric Vila, director of the Center for Geic Medice Rearch at Children’s Natnal Health System, told the Post, about what "mak" somebody gay. “There is no ‘gay gene’, ” says lead study thor Andrea Ganna, a geicist at the Broad Instute of MIT and Harvard Cambridge, and his lleagu also ed the analysis to timate that up to 25% of sexual behavur n be explaed by geics, wh the rt fluenced by environmental and cultural factors — a figure siar to the fdgs of smaller studi. Muny there said they were worried the fdgs uld give ammunn to people who seek to e science to bolster bias and discrimatn agast gay ncern is that evince that gen fluence same-sex behavr uld e anti-gay activists to ll for gene edg or embryo selectn, even if that would be technilly impossible.

Another fear is that evince that gen play only a partial role uld emboln people who sist beg gay is a choice and who advote tactics like nversn therapy.

IS THERE A “GAY GENE"?

Dpe s limatns, the rearch was much larger and more varied than prev studi, which generally foced on gay men, often those who were tws or were otherwise related. “That right there is the big issue wh lookg for the geics of sexual orientatn — social ntext uld be a big part of the exprsn of the tra, ” said Jeremy Yor, an assistant profsor of blogy at California State Universy, Northridge, who is gay and follows geic rearch the field.

THE 'GAY GENE' IS A TOTAL MYTH, MASSIVE STUDY CONCLUS

He and others noted that olr participants me of age when homosexual behavr was crimalized Bra and that for much of their life homosexualy was classified as a psychiatric Reilly and others said such stark differenc between olr and younger participants show the tricks of tryg to draw reprentative blogil rmatn om a study populatn so strongly fluenced by society’s changg attus. Dean Hamer, a former Natnal Instut of Health scientist who led the first high-profile study intifyg a geic lk to beg gay 1993, said he was happy to see such a large rearch effort. “Havg said that, I’d like to emphasize that ’s not a gay gene study — ’s a study of what mak people have a sgle same-sex experience or more, ” said Dr.