I had expected this study of psychology and genetics to remind me of Philip Larkin’s immortal words about how our parents mess us up, albeit without meaning to [1].

In Blueprint, however, Plomin [2] explains that the most significant, systematic influence that parents have on their children’s psychological traits is via their DNA sequence. He supports this assertion with evidence from studies conducted over many decades. Blueprint has been criticised for being a manifesto for genetic determinism, but in my opinion that is a misreading of the book. Plomin is clear that for each complex trait studied, genetic factors can only explain about half of the variance observed. There is no doubt that environmental factors and chance are very important, but how these factors will play out is unpredictable.

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