The Need for Strong Sensations is Genetic

A new study linked the need to do exciting things to genes in the dopamine system, and discovered a group of mutations that can predict someone's tendency towards sensation seeking.

The research on the genetics of sensation seeking was led by Jaime Derringer, a PhD student at the University of Minnesota and first author of the study.

She wanted to use a new technique so she used a kind of mutation in DNA called a single-nucleotide polymorphism, or SNP.

Derringer chose 8 genes that were related to the neurotransmitter dopamine, and she analyzed 635 people taking part in a study on addiction.

For every subject she gathered information on the 273 SNPs that appeared in these 8 genes and established how big their sensation seeking tendency was.

This way, Derringer managed to narrow down the 273 SNPs to only 12, and after combining them, she found explanations to only 4% of the difference between people in sensation seeking.

Even if 4% might seem a very small percentage, Derringer says that for a genetic study it is “quite large”.

Normally, sensation seeking has been linked to addictions and other behavioral disorders but the researcher says that it is not so bad though, because “not everyone who's high on sensation seeking becomes a drug addict, they may become an Army Ranger or an artist, it's all in how you channel it.”

Even after the results of this study, Derringer says that it's way too soon to go out and start screening people, as there are many more other things to find out about the way that behavior is affected by genes.

“One of the things we think is most exciting about this isn't necessarily the story about dopamine and sensation seeking,” Derringer says.

“It's rather the method that we're using; we used a sample of 635 people, which is extremely small, and we were still able to detect a significant effect.

“That's actually quite rare in these studies,” she added.

Apparently the same method could be used to investigate the link between genetics and other behaviors such as dopamine and cocaine dependence, or serotonin and depression, for example.

This new study was published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.