Variations in catechol-O-methyltransferase gene interact with parenting to influence attention in early development.

ABSTRACT: Attention influences many aspects of cognitive development. Variations in the catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) gene, known to affect dopamine neurotransmission, have frequently been found to influence attention in adults and older children. In this paper we examined 2 year old children and found that variation in the COMT gene influenced attention in a task involving looking to a sequence of visual stimuli. Because the influence of another dopamine-related gene (DRD4) has been shown to interact with parenting quality at this age, we explored parenting in relation to variations in the COMT gene. Variations in COMT interacted with parenting quality to influence our attention measure. The Val(108/158)Met polymorphism of COMT is commonly used to determine allelic groups, but recently haplot

SUBMITTER: Voelker P 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2760680 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature