Genetic Testing: Are You Nice or Nasty?

In the article, Genetic Difference Found in Wild vs. Tame Animals, researchers have found regions of genes that are responsible for the niceness and nastiness of animals. Since I have started looking into human behavior and genetics, this article interested me because it makes me wonder if the results from this study would be transferred to humans.

While many people wouldn’t really care about having a genetic test to determine whether they were nice or not, it may help the world of mental health and criminology. It’s already well documented that mental illness can be rooted in genes, but what if a criminal doesn’t have a mental disorder but just the “nastiness” genes? This can rule out whether psychiatric care would help a criminal or not.

This genetic testing could also be detrimental to a criminal who hopes for release someday. If a criminal shows that he has the “wild” gene, it may lower his/her chances of release since there may be a higher probability of the person participating in another crime.

What do you think about this? Do you believe that studying genetic difference of wild vs. tame animals can be transferred to humans? How can this information help humans if it can?

(Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/publik15/3510742705/)

June 15th, 2009 by Marcelina Hardy | Posted in Genetic Testing | (0)