Abstract

Gene–environment interaction research in psychiatry is new, and is a natural ally of neuroscience. Mental disorders have known environmental causes, but there is heterogeneity in the response to each causal factor, which gene–environment findings attribute to genetic differences at the DNA sequence level. Such findings come from epidemiology, an ideal branch of science for showing that gene–environment interactions exist in nature and affect a significant fraction of disease cases. The complementary discipline of epidemiology, experimental neuroscience, fuels gene–environment hypotheses and investigates underlying neural mechanisms. This article discusses opportunities and challenges in the collaboration between psychiatry, epidemiology and neuroscience in studying gene–environment interactions.

Author affiliations

1. Avshalom Caspi and Terrie Moffitt are at the Medical Research Council Social, Genetic and Developmental Psychiatry Centre, Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London, P0 Box 80 De Crespigny Park, London SE5 8AF, UK.
   They are also at the Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin, 1202 West Johnson Street, Madison, Wisconsin 53706, USA.

Correspondence to: Avshalom Caspi¹ Email: a.caspi@iop.kcl.ac.uk

Correspondence to: Terrie E. Moffitt¹ Email: t.moffitt@iop.kcl.ac.uk

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