Evidence map›Paper›PMID 40062537›Full record

ArticleAmerican journal of human biology : the official journal of the Human Biology Council2025

The Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder-Associated DRD4 7R Allele Predicts Household Economic Status but Not Nutritional Status in Northern Kenyan Rendille Children.

Amanda E Kunkle, Robert L Tennyson, Katherine Wander, Bettina Shell-Duncan, Dan T A Eisenberg

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in American journal of human biology : the official journal of the Human Biology Council, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.

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1 · What the graph read from it

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2 · The registry

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3 · Its place in the literature

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4 · The record

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5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors.

Amanda E KunkleDepartment of Anthropology, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, USA.ORCID 0000-0003-4016-3595
Robert L TennysonDepartment of Biological Sciences, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee, USA.ORCID 0000-0003-1982-1207
Katherine WanderDepartment of Anthropology, Binghamton University (SUNY), Binghamton, New York, USA.ORCID 0000-0002-4913-5075
Bettina Shell-DuncanDepartment of Anthropology, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, USA.
Dan T A EisenbergDepartment of Anthropology, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, USA.ORCID 0000-0003-0812-1862

Funding

Scientific/Technical CoreP2CHD042828 · NICHD · UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON · PI SARA R. CURRAN · 2017 to 2026
$6.3M
Population Research TrainingT32HD007543 · NICHD · UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON · PI CURRAN, SARA R. · 2002 to 2016
$2.3M
Center for Studies in Demography and Ecology, University of WashingtonNational Science Foundation Program in Physical Anthropology BCS-0200767NICHD NIH HHS P2C HD042828NICHD NIH HHS T32 HD007543University of Washington Royalty Research Fund
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

objectivesAround 11% of U.S. children are diagnosed with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). One hypothesis for ADHD's relatively high prevalence is that behaviors associated with ADHD were advantageous in past environments where they were positively selected for. A previous study showed that an allele associated with ADHD-the 7R allele of the gene encoding the D(4) dopamine receptor (DRD4)-had a positive effect on the nutritional status of nomadic adult Ariaal men and a negative effect on settled adult men. We attempted to replicate this finding by analyzing the impact of DRD4 7R on children's nutrition and other household metrics in the Rendille, a population closely related to the Ariaal.

methodsWe genotyped 259 Rendille children aged 5-10 years for DRD4 7R and analyzed this against previously collected anthropometric and household data from two Rendille towns. Analyses were pre-registered (https://osf.io/p8yv2/) before the addition of the 7R genotype to the dataset.

resultsDRD4 7R was not associated with iron nutrition, indicated by transferrin receptor (TfR) concentration, height-for-age (HAZ) or weight-for-height Z-scores (WHZ), or with maternal education status. However, DRD4 7R was positively associated with household economic status (p = 0.047).

conclusionsThe failure to replicate an association between DRD4 7R and nutritional status might be due to this sample being of children who are not yet substantially provisioning themselves. Given that children's genotypes are correlated with parents' genotypes, it is likely that the effects of the parents' genotypes, rather than the participating children's, explain the association between children's DRD4 7R genotype and household economic success.

Indexed as

Attention Deficit Disorder with HyperactivityNutritional StatusReceptors, Dopamine D4AllelesChildChild, PreschoolFemaleGenotypeHumansKenyaMaleDRD4 protein, humanReceptors, Dopamine D4ADHDDRD4evolutionary mismatch

Identifiers

PMID40062537
PMCPMC11925494

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.