EAS temperaments during the last half of the life span: twins reared apart and twins reared together.

In this first behavioral genetic study of personality in the last half of the life span, results are reported using the powerful adoption/twin design that compares identical and fraternal twins reared apart and identical and fraternal twins reared together. Traits studied were the EAS temperaments (emotionality, activity level, and sociability), traits that show substantial genetic influence in childhood. It was hypothesized that the EAS traits would also show significant genetic influence later in life and that most of the environmental variation would be nonshared--that is, twins reared together would show no greater resemblance for the EAS traits than twins reared apart. Both hypotheses are supported.