Genetic moderation of effects of maternal sensitivity on girl's age of menarche: Replication of the Manuck et al. study.

Manuck, Craig, Flory, Halder, and Ferrell (2011) reported that a theoretically anticipated effect of family rearing on girls' menarcheal age was genetically moderated by two single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of the estrogen receptor-α gene. We sought to replicate and extend these findings, studying 210 White females followed from birth. The replication was general because a different measure of the rearing environment was used in this inquiry (i.e., maternal sensitivity) than in the prior one (i.e., family cohesion). Extensions of the work included prospective rather than retrospective measurements of the rearing environment, reports of first menstruation within a year of its occurrence rather than decades later, accounting for some heritability of menarcheal age by controlling for maternal age of menarche, and using a new model-fitting approach to competitively compare diathesis-stress versus differential-susceptibility models of Gene × Environment interaction. The replication/extension effort proved successful in the case of both estrogen receptor-α SNPs, with the Gene × Environment interactions principally reflecting diathesis-stress: lower levels of maternal sensitivity predicted earlier age of menarche for girls homozygous for the minor alleles of either SNP but not for girls carrying other genotypes. Results are discussed in light of the new analytic methods adopted.