Do Environmental Factors Significantly Impact Height?

Do environmental factors significantly impact height?

Check out this answer from Consensus:

Environmental factors significantly impact height, both in humans and plants. Socioeconomic conditions, nutrition, and specific environmental stressors play crucial roles in determining height outcomes. While genetic factors are important, their influence is modulated by the environment, particularly in less favorable conditions. Understanding these interactions is essential for developing strategies to improve health and growth outcomes across populations.

Height is a complex trait influenced by a combination of genetic and environmental factors. Understanding the extent to which environmental factors impact height is crucial for public health and socioeconomic planning. This article explores the significant role of environmental factors in determining height, drawing on evidence from various research studies.

Environmental Influences on Height

Socioeconomic and Quality of Life Factors

Research indicates that environmental stressors such as income inequality, air pollution, GDP per capita, and life expectancy significantly correlate with adult height. A study analyzing data from 31 OECD countries found that both male and female heights were strongly correlated with indicators of a stressful environment, such as homicide rates and income inequality1. This suggests that better socioeconomic conditions and quality of life are associated with greater average heights.

Nutrition and Health

Nutrition during early childhood is a critical determinant of adult height. Poor nutrition can lead to growth retardation, which is reflected in shorter adult stature. A review of various studies highlights that short adult height in low- and middle-income countries is primarily driven by poor environmental conditions, particularly inadequate nutrition during early years4. This underscores the importance of ensuring adequate nutrition to promote optimal growth.

Genetic and Environmental Interactions

While genetic factors play a significant role in determining height, environmental factors can modulate genetic potential. A study on Finnish twins revealed that the heritability of height increased across birth cohorts, suggesting that as environmental conditions improved, genetic factors became more prominent in determining height8. This indicates that in poorer environments, environmental factors have a larger impact on height.

Case Studies in Plant Height

Soybean Plant Height

Environmental factors also significantly impact plant height, as demonstrated in studies on soybean. Research involving 308 soybean lines planted in different environments showed significant genotype × environment interactions affecting plant height traits. Factors such as average day-length, maximum temperature, soil pH, and available nitrogen were found to have substantial impacts on soybean height2 5. This highlights the broader applicability of environmental influences on height across different species.

Water-Use Efficiency in Forests

In cold-temperate larch forests, environmental factors at different canopy heights significantly affected leaf water-use efficiency, which in turn impacts overall plant height. Factors such as vapor pressure deficit, relative humidity, and net photosynthetic rate were identified as major determinants6. This further illustrates the critical role of environmental conditions in shaping growth patterns.

Do environmental factors significantly impact height?

Kelvin Yen has answered Near Certain

An expert from University of Southern California in Gerontology, Anti-Ageing

While a large portion of height is certainly heritable, even with the latest technology and largest cohorts, only 40% of the variability of height can be attributed to specific genes (Yango et al Nature 2022). Anecdotally, if one looks at people from emerging countries, their increase in average height over a decade or two can not be explained by genetics, and therefore would be environmental (most likely nutrition).

Do environmental factors significantly impact height?

William Muir has answered Near Certain

An expert from Purdue University in Genetics

Human height has one of the highest heritability’s among quantitative traits in humans. However it is not perfect, meaning that at least 10% of variation is environmental. This is under normal nutritional conditions, i.e. not under nourished. If you look at uniforms worn by soldiers over 100 years ago or more, very few current Americans or European males of the same age could fit into one of those.

This difference cannot be attributed to selection for greater height because humans tend to pair by height, meaning shorter people are contributing to the gene pool as mush as tall. The only explanation is that nutrition has improved over the last 100 years, particularly during the growth phase during youth.

Do environmental factors significantly impact height?

Peter Visscher has answered Near Certain

An expert from University of Queensland in Genetics

The answer is (clearly) yes: there is a lot of evidence that height increases over time when countries industrialise and/or get wealthier, and this change must be environmental because genetic factors don’t change over short periods of time (e.g. decades). The likely specific environmental factors are abundance of food and better healthcare.

Do environmental factors significantly impact height?

Eirini Marouli has answered Near Certain

An expert from Queen Mary University of London in Genetics, Bioinformatics, Statistics

The short answer is probably yes. Human height has steadily increased over the past two centuries across the globe. Genetics have an important role, but it would be hard to account exclusively for this rapid change in height. It is reasonable to assume that there is an upper limit to average height, at which nutritional and health factors are optimal. But it has also been hypothesized that recent lifestyle changes may be hindering further changes in the average height of humans. So, additional factors influencing height could include changes in healthcare, nutrition, and socioeconomic status. Could height have reached its limit? Only time can actually tell.

Do environmental factors significantly impact height?

Saverio Alberti has answered Likely

An expert from University of Messina in Genetics, Cancer, Cell Biology

The short answer is yes. An example that may fit is the height of the newborns during the 1944 famine in the Netherlands. The statistics need to be checked though.

Do environmental factors significantly impact height?

Steve Hsu has answered Near Certain

An expert from Michigan State University in Genomics, Artificial Intelligence, Physics

Under conditions of nutritional deprivation (e.g., insufficient protein, minerals, calories), children typically do not achieve their full potential for height. For example, a significant difference in height between North and South Koreans (in favor of the latter) has arisen as the latter country has developed economically. South Koreans tend to be much taller than their parents and grandparents.

In cases where nutrition and other living conditions are adequate height is largely determined by genetics. Adult height can be predicted from genotype alone (DNA) with accuracy roughly 3cm.

https://infoproc.blogspot.com/2018/08/scientists-of-stature.html