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People pick friends with similar genes

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Cheerful Asian friends hugging and smiling from Shutterstock
Cheerful Asian friends hugging and smiling from Shutterstock
Dragon Images
A recent study found that people are apt to pick friends who are genetically similar to themselves – so much so that friends tend to be as alike at the genetic level as a person's fourth cousin.

The findings were based on an examination of about 1.5 million markers of genetic variations in a group of nearly 2,000 people who had taken part in a long-running health study based in Massachusetts. The researchers compared people identified as friends to those who were not.

Olfactory genes

The study showed people were most similar to their friends in olfactory genes, which involve the sense of smell, and were least similar in relation to immune system genes.

Read: Genetic overlap seen in 5 mental disorders

"Olfactory genes have a straightforward explanation: People who like the same smells tend to be drawn to similar environments, where they meet others with the same tendencies," said one of the researchers, James Fowler, a professor of medical genetics and political science at the University of California, San Diego.

People choose spouses with similar DNA

The study, published in the scientific journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, follows research released in May that found that people tended to choose spouses who have similar DNA.

Read: People choose spouses with similar DNA

Fowler said the new findings made it clear that people have more DNA in common with those who are selected as friends than with strangers in the same population. Fourth cousins are people who have great-great-great grandparents in common.

Because the study population was largely homogeneous, mostly whites of European background, the findings "are less likely to be driven by the simple explanation that people of similar ancestry befriend one another," Fowler said.

Choosing and making friends still a mystery

Fellow researcher Nicholas Christakis, a Yale University professor of sociology, evolutionary biology and medicine, said the mechanism used by people to choose friends with similar genetics remained a mystery.

Read: Genetic insight into 'disease of kings'

"It could involve the workings of a postulated 'kin detection system' in humans," Christakis said. "Our fates depend not only on our own genes, but also on the genes of others around us, and in particular our friends."

Christakis said he was interested in finding out why people have friends in the first place.

"The making of friends is exceedingly rare in the animal kingdom," Christakis added. "Certain other primates, elephants and whales are the only other mammals who do this, and this alone aroused our curiosity."

Read more:

Gene discoveries could give insight into migraine
Faulty gene linked to allergies
Sleep terrors may be genetic


Image: Cheerful Asian friends hugging and smiling from Shutterstock
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