Implications of a Behavior Genetic Perspective in Behavioral Medicine

Abstract

The contributors to this volume have provided detailed accounts of current behavior genetic research on alcoholism and smoking as examples of addictive behaviors, on cardiovascular parameters important to our understanding of stress responses, and on eating disorders and anthropometric indices related to obesity. While these topics are by no means exhaustive, they do provide central and substantive examples of behavior genetic research in behavioral medicine. Beyond this focus on specific phenotypes, our contributors have also considered the more general issues of gender differences in genetic and environmental influences and the relationship between behavior genetics and health-related research in minority populations.