Origins of familial similarity in parenting: a study of twins and adoptive siblings.

Parents of young children completed questionnaires that assessed attitudes toward parenting and specific parenting practices, the emotional atmosphere of the home, and parental personality. These parents were themselves either identical twins (n = 90), fraternal twins (n = 56), or adoptive siblings (n = 40). Model-fitting results implicate modest genetic effects on affect-related aspects of parenting, such as parental warmth. The results add new dimensions to the growing body of literature that documents genetic influences on measures of the family environment and suggest that child-rearing variables are significantly related to the major factors of parental personality.