UCL Discovery Stage
UCL home » Library Services » Electronic resources » UCL Discovery Stage

Self-reported hearing loss questions provide a good measure for genetic studies: a polygenic risk score analysis from UK Biobank

Cherny, SS; Livshits, G; Wells, HRR; Freidin, MB; Malkin, I; Dawson, SJ; Williams, FMK; (2020) Self-reported hearing loss questions provide a good measure for genetic studies: a polygenic risk score analysis from UK Biobank. European Journal of Human Genetics 10.1038/s41431-020-0603-2. (In press). Green open access

[thumbnail of s41431-020-0603-2.pdf]
Preview
Text
s41431-020-0603-2.pdf - Published Version

Download (916kB) | Preview

Abstract

Age-related hearing impairment (ARHI) is very common in older adults and has major impact on quality of life. The heritability of ARHI has been estimated to be around 50%. The present study aimed to estimate heritability and environmental contributions to liability of ARHI and the extent to which a polygenic risk score (PRS) derived from a recent genome-wide association study of questionnaire items regarding hearing loss using the UK Biobank is predictive of hearing loss in other samples. We examined (1) a sample from TwinsUK who have had hearing ability measured by pure-tone audiogram and the speech-to-noise ratio test as well as questionnaire measures that are comparable with the UK Biobank questionnaire items and (2) European and non-European samples from the UK Biobank which were not part of the original GWAS. Results indicated that the questionnaire items were over 50% heritable in TwinsUK and comparable with the objective hearing measures. In addition, we found very high genetic correlation (0.30–0.84) between the questionnaire responses and objective hearing measures in the TwinsUK sample. Finally, PRS computed from weighted UK Biobank GWAS results were predictive of both questionnaire and objective measures of hearing loss in the TwinsUK sample, as well as questionnaire-measured hearing loss in Europeans but not non-European subpopulations. These results demonstrate the utility of questionnaire-based methods in genetic association studies of hearing loss in adults and highlight the differences in genetic predisposition to ARHI by ethnic background.

Type: Article
Title: Self-reported hearing loss questions provide a good measure for genetic studies: a polygenic risk score analysis from UK Biobank
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1038/s41431-020-0603-2
Publisher version: http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41431-020-0603-2
Language: English
Additional information: Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences > The Ear Institute
URI: https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10094247
Downloads since deposit
2,196Downloads
Download activity - last month
Download activity - last 12 months
Downloads by country - last 12 months

Archive Staff Only

View Item View Item