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We interrogate the joint genetic architecture of 11 major psychiatric disorders at biobehavioral, functional genomic and molecular genetic levels of analysis. We identify four broad factors (neurodevelopmental, compulsive, psychotic and internalizing) that underlie genetic correlations among the disorders and test whether these factors adequately explain their genetic correlations with biobehavioral traits. We introduce stratified genomic structural equation modeling, which we use to identify gene sets that disproportionately contribute to genetic risk sharing. This includes protein-truncating variant-intolerant genes expressed in excitatory and GABAergic brain cells that are enriched for genetic overlap across disorders with psychotic features. Multivariate association analyses detect 152 (20 new) independent loci that act on the individual factors and identify nine loci that act heterogeneously across disorders within a factor. Despite moderate-to-high genetic correlations across all 11 disorders, we find little utility of a single dimension of genetic risk across psychiatric disorders either at the level of biobehavioral correlates or at the level of individual variants., (© 2022. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature America, Inc.)

Objective: A systematic review of studies using molecular genetics and statistical approaches to investigate the role of common genetic variation in the development, persistence, and comorbidity of childhood psychiatric traits was conducted., Method: A literature review was performed using the PubMed database, following PRISMA guidelines. There were 131 studies meeting inclusion criteria, having investigated at least one type of childhood-onset or childhood-measured psychiatric disorder or trait with the aim of identifying trait-associated common genetic variants, estimating the contribution of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) to the amount of variance explained (SNP-based heritability), investigating genetic overlap between psychiatric traits, or investigating whether the stability in traits or the association with adult traits is explained by genetic factors., Results: The first robustly associated genetic variants have started to be identified for childhood psychiatric traits. There were substantial contributions of common genetic variants to many traits, with variation in single nucleotide polymorphism heritability estimates depending on age and raters. Moreover, genetic variants also appeared to explain comorbidity as well as stability across a range of psychiatric traits in childhood and across the life span., Conclusion: Common genetic variation plays a substantial role in childhood psychiatric traits. Increased sample sizes will lead to increased power to identify genetic variants and to understand genetic architecture, which will ultimately be beneficial to targeted and prevention strategies. This can be achieved by harmonizing phenotype measurements, as is already proposed by large international consortia and by including the collection of genetic material in every study., (Copyright © 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: Childhood mental health problems are partly influence by genetic factors with heritability estimates varying between 40% and 90%., Aim: We provide examples of genetic research focusing on explaining the continuity of symptoms and the association between parental traits and offspring psychopathology., Method: We summarize two recently publish review papers RESULTS: There are significant genetic correlations between childhood and adult mental disorders. Genetic factors also explain part of the associations between parental traits and offspring psychopathology, because parents and children share 50% of their genetic material., Conclusion: The role of genetic factors is not restricted to influencing the risk to develop a mental disorder. They also play a role in persistence of symptoms and the associations with the environment.