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Associations Between Fetal Growth and Self-Perceived Health Throughout Adulthood: A Co-twin Control Study

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Abstract

The literature shows evidence for long-lasting effects of low birth weight (LBW) on many health outcomes, but little is known about effects on self-perceived health. Findings are mixed and studies are small, mostly focusing on LBW effects on health outcomes before adulthood. Further, as LBW and most health conditions including self-perceived health are partly heritable, associations between birth weight (BW) and adverse health outcomes may also be due to shared genetic as well as other (pre- and postnatal) unmeasured environmental influences. We explored LBW effects on self-perceived health in early and later adulthood using a very large and genetically informative sample of more than 50,000 Swedish twins. In addition, analyses within twin pairs (the co-twin control design) were used to examine potential associations between BW and the offspring’s risk for poor self-perceived health independent of shared environmental or genetic factors, evidence which is critical for the understanding of underlying mechanisms. Results showed that lower BW was significantly associated with poorer self-perceived health during adulthood, although the effect size was small. Co-twin control analyses suggested that this increased risk may be due to shared underlying liability (environmental or genetic) rather than a direct effect of BW, but findings were not conclusive.

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Acknowledgments

The present work was supported by NIH Grant AG037985, the Swedish Research Council 521-2013-8689, the Swedish Research Council for Health, Working Life and Welfare 2013-2292, and the European Union’s Seventh Framework Program (FP7/2011-2015 Under Grant Agreement 259679). The Swedish Twin Registry is supported by the Swedish Ministry of Higher Education. We would like to thank the Swedish twins for their participation.

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Correspondence to Miriam A. Mosing.

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Mosing, M.A., Cnattingius, S., Gatz, M. et al. Associations Between Fetal Growth and Self-Perceived Health Throughout Adulthood: A Co-twin Control Study. Behav Genet 46, 457–466 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10519-015-9776-9

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