Do you think trauma can be passed on genetically?

Is trauma passed on genetically? 🧬

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For those of you that don't know generational trauma in the context of sociology and economics refers to hardships being passed down through generations in marginalized communities. An example of this would be a community of African American's in a small southern town having a disproportionately low number of college graduates. This being due to most of their parents not having a bachelors degree which is do to their grandparents not being physically able to attend their local university back before the civil rights movement. This leads to a cultural idea that higher education isn't practical or realistically attainable as well as a lack of excess funds (low economic opportunities leads to a low inheritance and lack of financial support) to support an college education.

I know nothing of biology as a discipline, but how is this possible? Is it even possible? Did I miscomprehend something? How can something my parents dealt with be physically coded into their genetic traits after already being experienced?

It sounds like pseudoscience on the surface, but I want to be open-minded.
 
Plies said:
For those of you that don't know generational trauma in the context of sociology and economics refers to hardships being passed down through generations in marginalized communities. An example of this would be a community of African American's in a small southern town having a disproportionately low number of college graduates. This being due to most of their parents not having a bachelors degree which is do to their grandparents not being physically able to attend their local university back before the civil rights movement. This leads to a cultural idea that higher education isn't practical or realistically attainable as well as a lack of excess funds (low economic opportunities leads to a low inheritance and lack of financial support) to support an college education.

I know nothing of biology as a discipline, but how is this possible? Is it even possible? Did I miscomprehend something? How can something my parents dealt with be physically coded into their genetic traits after already being experienced?

It sounds like pseudoscience on the surface, but I want to be open-minded.
Click to expand...
I dont think it means genetically but culturally.
Genetically you would be talking about epigenetics - histone code kind of stuff rather than DNA.
You need a possibly in the poll. Epigentics is kinda a new science so is open to abuse but would provide a possible pathway for trauma to be inherited.
 
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Epigenetics falls under the common understanding of genetics as far I'm concerned. I don't believe in pseudo scientific psychological theories like racial memory going back millennia or past lives.
 
There is some evidence to suggest that certain environmentally affected traits of parents could affect how the genes of their kids are expressed. Like obesity, for example.

USDA ARS Online Magazine Vol. 58, No. 3

agresearchmag.ars.usda.gov agresearchmag.ars.usda.gov

"Our study strongly suggests that exposure to the mother's obesity—while in the womb—results in programming of the offspring's body-weight-control mechanisms," he says. "The dams' obesity alone was sufficient to significantly increase the pups' susceptibility to obesity."
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Newborns of obese parents have altered DNA methylation patterns at imprinted genes - PMC

Several epidemiologic studies have demonstrated associations between periconceptional environmental exposures and health status of the offspring in later life. Although these environmentally related effects have been attributed to epigenetic ...
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

We found altered methylation outcomes at multiple imprint regulatory regions in children born to obese parents, compared with children born to non-obese parents. In spite of the small sample size, our data suggest a preconceptional influence of parental life-style or overnutrition on the (re)programming of imprint marks during gametogenesis and early development. More specifically, the significant and independent association between paternal obesity and the offspring's methylation status suggests the susceptibility of the developing sperm for environmental insults. The acquired imprint instability may be carried onto the next generation and increase the risk for chronic diseases in adulthood.
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Plies said:
An example of this would be a community of African American's in a small southern town having a disproportionately low number of college graduates. This being due to most of their parents not having a bachelors degree which is do to their grandparents not being physically able to attend their local university back before the civil rights movement. This leads to a cultural idea that higher education isn't practical or realistically attainable as well as a lack of excess funds (low economic opportunities leads to a low inheritance and lack of financial support) to support an college education.
Click to expand...

This example is more likely a product of systemic/institutional racism and how it prevents certain demographics from effectively building up generational wealth over time.
 
There is definitely a lot about inherited traits or behavior that we have little understanding. Maybe not Lamarkian inheritance per se but some type of transmission of behavior beyond DNA. How granular the 'lesson' can be is up for debate, I find it hard to belive that you could encode "stay away from green snakes" in this fashion, for example. But clearly there are ways.to pass on that type of instinctual behavior.
 
Assassin's Creed taught me that you contain all the memories of your ancestors inside you and you can unlock them and even relive them if you have technology that is advanced enough

Curiously, AC didn't even invent this concept. It goes all the way back to Frank Herbert and his Dune Chronicles
 
If I had to think of an example for this, it would be snakes or spiders. I'd be interested to know how many people have this fear despite growing up in inner cities
 
Unknown Soldier said:
Assassin's Creed taught me that you contain all the memories of your ancestors inside you and you can unlock them and even relive them if you have technology that is advanced enough

Curiously, AC didn't even invent this concept. It goes all the way back to Frank Herbert and his Dune Chronicles
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The concept was also touched on in Xenogears (1998).
 
I'm an Orphan. There's nothing to it.

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Mistake said:
If I had to think of an example for this, it would be snakes or spiders. I'd be interested to know how many people have this fear despite growing up in inner cities
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I grew up in a city where the wildest thing around was maybe a pigeon with an attitude and I still get that automatic flinch response when I see a spider. It's interesting because there's no real reason for it, no personal trauma, nothing I can trace back

It really does make you wonder if some of these fears are hardwired, like traces of ancestral trauma encoded into our DNA

Like our ancestors saw one guy get bitten once and evolution collectively went, "Yeah, let's never do that again." So now, thousands of years later, we're jumping at house spiders the size of a fingernail
 
Yes. I believe there is genetic memory, but exactly how it works I have no clue about. I mean, if animal instinct can be passed down so that butterflies know how to fly to a different continent, despite never having travelled there before, then I can't see genetic memory in humans as any controversial stuff.

A traumatic memory could be a strong candidate when it comes to ways of surviving life in the future. Though I don't think anyone benefits from blaming how their ancestors were treated and making themself a victim, instead of just dealing with their own life through therapy as good as they can.
 
yea ,that's how DNA works

there's animal studies to show this; exposing mice to traumatic events and certain smells produced offsprings that'll have heightened sensitivy to the same smell without prior exposure

www.scientificamerican.com

Fearful Memories Passed Down to Mouse Descendants

Genetic imprint from traumatic experiences carries through at least two generations
www.scientificamerican.com www.scientificamerican.com
 
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Genetically no. However behaving as your parents did who you trust and guide you in starting out clearly is a possibility that can affect us all
 
Physical and emotional stress of the mother can have significant epigenetical effect on the development of the unborn child (link).

I doubt specific traumas can me inherited via genes.
 
Yes it can. It also can cause biological changes. In rats they conducted experiments were they would have them smell something then shock them when they did. The found in off spring the olfactory sensors were more clustered together and more abundant in order to have a better chance of sniffing it out. You can also read up on the famine in England and Ireland and how human offspring from this time were affected. I'll see if I can dig some stuff up.

Here is an example:
www.nature.com

The hunger strikes back: an epigenetic memory for autophagy - Cell Death & Differentiation

Historical and demographical human cohorts of populations exposed to famine, as well as animal studies, revealed that exposure to food deprivation is associated to lasting health-related effects for the exposed individuals, as well as transgenerational effects in their offspring that affect...
www.nature.com www.nature.com
 
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I'm still smarting over what Rome did to Carthage the cunts...

On a serious note, being from Northern Ireland we have a lot of people claiming intergenerational trauma from the troubles even though they weren't born nor lived through it but still go fucking on about it as if they have, my dad got ambushed by the IRA, I've been in pubs moments before they where blew up and had some amusing run ins with local terrorists throughout my years and these wee wankers claim oh woe is me, if it didn't happen to you directly or effect you directly then wise up
 
"I'm not successful because of something that happened to my great-great-great-great-great pappy 200 years ago" sounds like a weak man's argument to me.
 
I've heard that genes can activate and deactivate during a person's life. Psychological trauma also affects a person physically.

After a person is traumatised and has a child there could be a way for the trauma to have some kind of effect on the offspring.
 
you guys have been playing too much Assassins creed.

If anything, it's inherently culturally.

but don't go blaming your great-great-great-gam-gam cause you're too scared to ask a gal out
 
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No. But it can influence how you parent and affect those around you negatively or positively. Depending on how you deal with it.
 
John Bilbo said:
Psychological trauma also affects a person physically.
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Of course it does, it impacts the brains neural pathways and the chemical makeup as well as causing changes to the nervous system as a whole.

All thoughts and feelings are physical since the reason you have them is a physical process that happens inside the brain/body in response to stimulus.

This idea that mental and physical health are separate does not hold given the evidence we have. Mental health is a subset of physical health just like cardiovascular health is or muscular health or even skeletal and joint health are.

Just look at the story of Phineas Gage or others who suffer brain injuries and have substantial personality shifts. You can see in scans that people who have PTSD have a smaller pre frontal cortex and hippocampus than those who do not.
 
No and I think it's important to define what you mean by trauma as recently it's become a pseudonym for any kind of adversity.
 
12Goblins said:
yea ,that's how DNA works

there's animal studies to show this; exposing mice to traumatic events and certain smells produced offsprings that'll have heightened sensitivy to the same smell without prior exposure

www.scientificamerican.com

Fearful Memories Passed Down to Mouse Descendants

Genetic imprint from traumatic experiences carries through at least two generations
www.scientificamerican.com www.scientificamerican.com
Click to expand...
I hate the fact that my ancestor had a really traumatic experience turning off the light button once so now my OCD brain needs to turn it on and off ten times to feel calm.
 
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12Goblins said:
yea ,that's how DNA works

there's animal studies to show this; exposing mice to traumatic events and certain smells produced offsprings that'll have heightened sensitivy to the same smell without prior exposure

www.scientificamerican.com

Fearful Memories Passed Down to Mouse Descendants

Genetic imprint from traumatic experiences carries through at least two generations
www.scientificamerican.com www.scientificamerican.com
Click to expand...
That is a controversial study on mice, we know next to nothing about how this works. If it was this extreme and common as in that test, we would have noticed this in people to a significant extent.
 
kpopSuperstar said:
That is a controversial study on mice, we know next to nothing about how this works. If it was this extreme and common as in that test, we would have noticed this in people to a significant extent.
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Why are people afraid of bees...or spiders (besides Australlians)? Sure tou don't want to get bit or stung but do you need to screech?
 
Durien said:
Why are people afraid of bees...or spiders (besides Australlians)? Sure tou don't want to get bit or stung but do you need to screech?
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That's different, that is long term evolution, without it we would not exist.

This particular study is about fear being passed down after one generation.
 
kpopSuperstar said:
That is a controversial study on mice, we know next to nothing about how this works. If it was this extreme and common as in that test, we would have noticed this in people to a significant extent.
Click to expand...
Not sure how you drew that conclusion from this study. It says nothing about people, or even if epigenetic changes last more than one generation, etc
 
Others have touched on a couple good points.

I'll add Richard Dawkins' original idea of the meme as a cultural version of a gene. Some things aren't passed down genetically but they're absolutely learned generationally from parents and those round us.

Outside of that you have evolution by way of natural selection, which explains how we have certain instinctual responses to things that we don't understand as learned traits. The ones that were fearful of spiders and snakes lived long enough to pass on their genes.
 
Isnt that the point of evolution? Over time, people inherently learn and become what they are based on their past ancestors.

However, it actually kind of goes against it. The point of organisms changing over time is to accustom to the environment by naturally being born with boosted traits. So if anything, anyone whose family tree is born to poor conditions should actually have newborns boosted to overcome it. While a family tree that has been royalty rich going back 800 years should maybe have lazy ass kids since their DNA knows they've had it good and comfortable for eons. So why bother trying. Just coast.

IMO, the vast majority of people's lives come from a combo of self effort, the hand they are dealt (good gov or shit gov kind of thing), and having good friends and fam to foster a good upbringing even if youre poor. You can overcome hardships. Just like a born rich guy doesn't mean he cant fuck it all up too.

Just because a fam doesn't have money where their illiterate grandparents had shitty labourer jobs 100 years ago means hope is lost. Look at how well many Indian and Asian families do. It's not like there are all born rich. But they consistently do well in school and can rise from poor fam situations. So even though their country might not be the richest country with the snazziest economic industry (mediocre hand dealt), there's still enough gov and parental effort to still do the best you can with what you got. And that's a cultural thing.

It doesn't matter what your situation really is. IMO, as long as you do the right thing and go to school and get a decent education to help you get a job and stay out of trouble, that already will be a boost to success. And support your fam and friends best as possible, so good will cycles through out your network. I'm not even a parent. But I always treat my nieces and nephews great being a great uncle. At first it was easy being the fun uncle buying them cool shit and taking them to Chuck E Cheese. Now they are older. No more cuddly shit treating them like babies. My bro and me are now at a stage of giving advice on university and jobs. And my bro/sis in law know I'm always around to help out whether it's babysitting them long time ago because they want to take a night off from the goofy kids going out to dinner, or going out of my way to pick them up from swimming class. This type of shit might sound sissy-ish. But it's family structure. I cant change the government or environment. But I can do my best being an uncle. If I wanted to, I could be the distant uncle you see once every 10 years. And if anyone needs some help I tell them fuck off. Why would I do that? And I always told them in my will I'm giving my money to them when I die. That's another family structural thing that is life changing. I can blow all my money just enjoying life, but I'm not that kind of guy. I've always want to have a bunch of money left for sake of achievement and passing it down even though I dont even have kids of my own. But I know the $$$ can help them out just in case.
 
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