{"id":54783,"date":"2025-04-27T12:48:17","date_gmt":"2025-04-27T12:48:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/54783\/"},"modified":"2025-04-27T12:48:17","modified_gmt":"2025-04-27T12:48:17","slug":"twin-modelling-reveals-partly-distinct-genetic-pathways-to-music-enjoyment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/54783\/","title":{"rendered":"Twin modelling reveals partly distinct genetic pathways to music enjoyment"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Ethics<\/p>\n<p>Both waves of data collection (see below) were approved by the Regional Ethical Review Board in Stockholm (Dnrs 2011\/570-31\/5, 2012\/1107\/32, 2021-02014, 2022-00109-02, 2020-02575). All methods and procedures followed international guidelines in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki.<\/p>\n<p>SampleSwedish Twin Registry: Screening Twin Adults Genes and Environment (STAGE)<\/p>\n<p>Participants were twins recruited from the Swedish Twin Registry<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 71\" title=\"Zagai, U., Lichtenstein, P., Pedersen, N. L. &amp; Magnusson, P. K. E. The Swedish Twin Registry: content and management as a research infrastructure. Twin Res. Hum. Genet. 22, 672&#x2013;680 (2019).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR71\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2637\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">71<\/a>. Twin zygosity was determined by questionnaire data, which, when compared to genotypes, has been shown to be 99% accurate in the Swedish Twin Registry<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 72\" title=\"Lichtenstein, P. et al. The Swedish Twin Registry: a unique resource for clinical, epidemiological and genetic studies. J. Intern. Med. 252, 184&#x2013;205 (2002).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR72\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2641\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">72<\/a>. The twins included in this study took part in two large recent waves of online data collection on music, art, and cultural engagement. In 2011 and then again in 2022, a total of 32,005 adult twin individuals were invited from the STAGE cohort born between 1959 and 1985, of which around 11,500 participated in the first wave and then around 9500 in the latest wave. In the first wave of data collection, participants completed the Swedish Musical Discrimination Test (see below). More details on this wave can be found in Ull\u00e9n et al.<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 12\" title=\"Ull&#xE9;n, F., Mosing, M. A., Holm, L., Eriksson, H. &amp; Madison, G. Psychometric properties and heritability of a new online test for musicality, the Swedish Musical Discrimination Test. Personal. Individ. Differ. 63, 87&#x2013;93 (2014).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR12\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2645\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">12<\/a>. Additionally, in the second wave, the Behavioral Approach System<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 39\" title=\"Carver, C. S. &amp; White, T. L. Behavioral inhibition, behavioral activation, and affective responses to impending reward and punishment: the BIS\/BAS scales. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 67, 319&#x2013;333 (1994).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR39\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2649\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">39<\/a> and Barcelona Music Reward Questionnaire<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 10\" title=\"Mas-Herrero, E., Marco-Pallares, J., Lorenzo-Seva, U., Zatorre, R. J. &amp; Rodriguez-Fornells, A. Individual differences in music reward experiences. Music Percept. 31, 118&#x2013;138 (2013).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR10\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2653\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">10<\/a> were administered. We note that response rates in the STAGE cohort have been low (~30%). The low response rates presumably reflect that this is a population-based study (i.e., where a whole birth cohort of Swedish twins is invited to participate) of a working-aged cohort; this is a general phenomenon not unique to our study<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 71\" title=\"Zagai, U., Lichtenstein, P., Pedersen, N. L. &amp; Magnusson, P. K. E. The Swedish Twin Registry: content and management as a research infrastructure. Twin Res. Hum. Genet. 22, 672&#x2013;680 (2019).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR71\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2658\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">71<\/a>. A full description of the twin sample across waves of data collection can be found in Table\u00a0<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-track-action=\"table anchor\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#Tab1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">1<\/a>, including n of twins for which we had both data available, stratified by the zygosity and the sex of the twins; for both waves of data collection, informed consent was given by each participant before data gathering began.<\/p>\n<p>Primary measureBarcelona Music Reward Questionnaire (BMRQ)<\/p>\n<p>The Barcelona Music Reward Questionnaire (BMRQ) is a psychometric tool used to assess musical anhedonia<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 11\" title=\"Mas-Herrero, E., Zatorre, R. J., Rodriguez-Fornells, A. &amp; Marco-Pallar&#xE9;s, J. Dissociation between musical and monetary reward responses in specific musical anhedonia. Curr. Biol. 24, 699&#x2013;704 (2014).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR11\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2681\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">11<\/a>,<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 15\" title=\"Mart&#xED;nez-Molina, N., Mas-Herrero, E., Rodr&#xED;guez-Fornells, A., Zatorre, R. J. &amp; Marco-Pallar&#xE9;s, J. Neural correlates of specific musical anhedonia. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 113, E7337&#x2013;E7345 (2016).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR15\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2684\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">15<\/a> and, more generally, music reward sensitivity<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 10\" title=\"Mas-Herrero, E., Marco-Pallares, J., Lorenzo-Seva, U., Zatorre, R. J. &amp; Rodriguez-Fornells, A. Individual differences in music reward experiences. Music Percept. 31, 118&#x2013;138 (2013).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR10\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2688\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">10<\/a>, which has previously been validated across many cultures<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 10\" title=\"Mas-Herrero, E., Marco-Pallares, J., Lorenzo-Seva, U., Zatorre, R. J. &amp; Rodriguez-Fornells, A. Individual differences in music reward experiences. Music Percept. 31, 118&#x2013;138 (2013).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR10\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2692\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">10<\/a>,<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" title=\"Honda, S. et al. The Japanese Version of the Barcelona Music Reward Questionnaire (J-BMRQ) confirms the cross-cultural generalizability of the &#x201C;five-factor&#x201D; model. &#10;                  https:\/\/doi.org\/10.31234\/osf.io\/7qp45&#10;                  &#10;                 (2024).\" href=\"#ref-CR68\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2695\">68<\/a>,<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" title=\"Wang, J. et al. The Chinese version of the Barcelona Music Reward Questionnaire (BMRQ): associations with personality traits and gender. Music. Sci. 27, 218&#x2013;232 (2023).\" href=\"#ref-CR69\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2695_1\">69<\/a>,<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 70\" title=\"Saliba, J. et al. French validation of the Barcelona Music Reward Questionnaire. PeerJ 4, e1760 (2016).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR70\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2698\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">70<\/a>. It comprises 20 self-report items, with five response options, ranging from completely disagree to completely agree. After recoding response items to numeric options (1\u20135), with two out of 20 items being reverse coded, we used the sum score of the BMRQ as a measure of music reward sensitivity (score range from 20 to 100). Following the original five-factor structure<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 10\" title=\"Mas-Herrero, E., Marco-Pallares, J., Lorenzo-Seva, U., Zatorre, R. J. &amp; Rodriguez-Fornells, A. Individual differences in music reward experiences. Music Percept. 31, 118&#x2013;138 (2013).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR10\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2702\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">10<\/a>, we also created sum scores of the five known facets of music reward sensitivity<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 29\" title=\"Mas-Herrero, E. Auditory pleasure elicited by music. In The Routledge International Handbook of Neuroaesthetics (Routledge, 2022).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR29\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2706\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">29<\/a>: (1) Emotion evocation &#8211; the degree to which individuals get emotional, experience chills, and even cry when listening to music; (2) Mood regulation &#8211; the degree to which individuals experience rewards from relaxing when listening to music; (3) Musical seeking \u2013 the pleasure associated with the discovery of novel music-related information; (4) Sensory motor \u2013 the rewards obtained from synchronising to an external beat or dancing; (5) Social reward \u2013 the rewards of social bonding through music. Additional details are given in Supplementary Note\u00a0<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-track-action=\"supplementary material anchor\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#MOESM1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">5<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Secondary measuresBehavioral Approach System Reward Responsiveness (BAS-RR)<\/p>\n<p>The Behavioral Approach System (BAS) scale is included in the Behavioral Inhibition System (BIS)\/BAS questionnaire, a validated psychometric tool to assess inter-individual differences in two general motivational systems<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 39\" title=\"Carver, C. S. &amp; White, T. L. Behavioral inhibition, behavioral activation, and affective responses to impending reward and punishment: the BIS\/BAS scales. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 67, 319&#x2013;333 (1994).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR39\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2727\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">39<\/a>,<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 73\" title=\"Eriksson, L. J. K., Jansson, B. &amp; Sundin, &#xD6;. Psychometric properties of a Swedish version of the reinforcement sensitivity theory of personality questionnaire. Nord. Psychol. 71, 134&#x2013;145 (2019).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR73\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2730\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">73<\/a>. The BAS-Reward Responsiveness (BAS-RR) scale, in particular, assesses inter-individual differences in the ability to experience pleasure in the anticipation and presence of reward-related stimuli and predicts general psychological adaptive functioning<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 74\" title=\"Taubitz, L. E., Pedersen, W. S. &amp; Larson, C. L. BAS reward responsiveness: a unique predictor of positive psychological functioning. Pers. Individ. Differ. 80, 107&#x2013;112 (2015).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR74\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2734\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">74<\/a>. It comprises five items, with four response options for each. BAS-RR is obtained by the sum score of the five items after the numerical conversion of the responses (1\u20134). Additional details are given in Supplementary Note\u00a0<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-track-action=\"supplementary material anchor\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#MOESM1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">6<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Swedish Musical Discrimination Test (SMDT)<\/p>\n<p>The Swedish Musical Discrimination Test (SMDT) is a test that has good psychometric qualities for individual abilities in auditory perceptual discrimination of musical stimuli<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 12\" title=\"Ull&#xE9;n, F., Mosing, M. A., Holm, L., Eriksson, H. &amp; Madison, G. Psychometric properties and heritability of a new online test for musicality, the Swedish Musical Discrimination Test. Personal. Individ. Differ. 63, 87&#x2013;93 (2014).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR12\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2749\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">12<\/a>. It comprises three subtests: melody, rhythm, and pitch. A brief description of each test is given below (see ref. <a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 12\" title=\"Ull&#xE9;n, F., Mosing, M. A., Holm, L., Eriksson, H. &amp; Madison, G. Psychometric properties and heritability of a new online test for musicality, the Swedish Musical Discrimination Test. Personal. Individ. Differ. 63, 87&#x2013;93 (2014).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR12\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2753\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">12<\/a> for more details).<\/p>\n<p>                    Melody<\/p>\n<p>This subtest used isochronous sequences of piano tones as stimuli. Tones ranged from C4 to A#5, played at 650\u2009ms intervals (American standard pitch; 262\u2013932\u2009Hz). The number of tones increased from four to nine during the subtest progression. For each of the six stimulus lengths, there were three items. The two stimuli in an item were separated by 1.3\u2009s of silence. The pitch of one tone in the melody was always different in the second stimulus. Participants had to identify which tone was different.<\/p>\n<p>                    Rhythm<\/p>\n<p>In this subtest, each item included two brief rhythmic sequences of 5\u20137 sine tones, lasting 60\u2009ms each. The inter-onset intervals between tones in a sequence were 150, 300, 450, or 600\u2009ms. The two sequences in an item were either identical or different and separated by 1\u2009s of silence. The participant had to determine whether the two sequences were the same or not.<\/p>\n<p>                    Pitch<\/p>\n<p>The pitch subtest used sine tones with a 590\u2009ms duration as stimuli. In each item, two tones were presented, one of which always had a frequency of 500\u2009Hz. The frequency of the other tone was set between 501 and 517\u2009Hz. The order of the two tones varied randomly, with tones separated by a 1\u2009s silence gap. Participants had to identify whether the first or the second tone had the highest pitch. The item difficulty was increased progressively by gradually making the pitch differences between the tones smaller.<\/p>\n<p>                  AnalysesThreshold for statistical significance (\u03b1 value)<\/p>\n<p>Throughout the whole study, we used an adjusted alpha of \u03b1\u2009=\u20090.007. The adjusted alpha was obtained via the Bonferroni correction as \u03b1\u2009=\u20090.05\/Meff. Meff\u2009=\u20097 is the number of effective tests accounting for dependency between variables and was obtained, following<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 75\" title=\"Gao, X., Starmer, J. &amp; Martin, E. R. A multiple testing correction method for genetic association studies using correlated single nucleotide polymorphisms. Genet. Epidemiol. 32, 361&#x2013;369 (2008).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR75\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2802\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">75<\/a>, as the number of eigenvalues required to explain 99.5% of the variance across all the variables included in this study. (The correlation matrix included seven variables, i.e., the SMDT and BAS-RR total scores and the five BMRQ facets\u2019 scores; we have excluded the BMRQ total score as it is a linear combination of the five BMRQ facets\u2019 scores.) Meff was computed using the meff(method\u2009=\u2009\u201cgao\u201d) function from the poolr R package<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 76\" title=\"Cinar, O. &amp; Viechtbauer, W. The poolr Package for Combining Independent and Dependent p Values. J. Stat. Softw 101, 1&#x2013;42 (2022).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR76\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2811\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">76<\/a>. Alternative methods (e.g., Li &amp; Ji<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 77\" title=\"Li, J. &amp; Ji, L. Adjusting multiple testing in multilocus analyses using the eigenvalues of a correlation matrix. Heredity 95, 221&#x2013;227 (2005).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR77\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2815\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">77<\/a>) resulted in a less conservative alpha (i.e., Meff <\/p>\n<p>Factor analysis<\/p>\n<p>To confirm the BMRQ\u2019s sum score as an appropriate measure of music reward sensitivity in the Swedish sample, we ran a one-factor Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) on the five facets of the Swedish version of the BMRQ. CFA was run on one twin per pair, using the lavaan::cfa() function, to avoid sample dependence.<\/p>\n<p>Classical twin design (CTD)<\/p>\n<p>The CTD allows the estimation of additive (A) or dominance (D) genetic, common environmental (C), and residual source (E) of phenotypic variance (\u03c3A2, \u03c3D2, \u03c3C2, and \u03c3E2, respectively). This is possible given the expected phenotypic resemblance of monozygotic (MZ) and dizygotic (DZ) twins. MZ twins arise from the same fertilised egg and thus are ~100% genetically similar (with minimal deviations from expected genetic similarity, see ref. <a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 78\" title=\"Jonsson, H. et al. Differences between germline genomes of monozygotic twins. Nat. Genet. 53, 27&#x2013;34 (2021).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR78\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2852\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">78<\/a>); DZ twins arise from separate egg cells and thus, as ordinary siblings, share on average 50% of their segregating genes. Furthermore, when both twins of a pair are raised in the same household, MZ and DZ twins share 100% of their common environment. Finally, by definition, remaining deviations from the expected values inferred by additive, dominance, and common environmental effects represent non-common environmental influences and measurement errors. Therefore, E is not shared between twins within a family. Under a set of assumptions, including no epistasis (gene-by-gene interaction, see ref. <a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 79\" title=\"Keller, M. C. &amp; Coventry, W. L. Quantifying and addressing parameter indeterminacy in the classical twin design. Twin Res. Hum. Genet. 8, 201&#x2013;213 (2005).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR79\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e2856\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">79<\/a>), the covariance of MZ twin pairs is then equal to:<\/p>\n<p>$${\\sigma }_{{MZ},{MZ}}={\\sigma }_{A}^{2}+{\\sigma }_{D}^{2}+{\\sigma }_{C}^{2}$$<\/p>\n<p>\n                    (1)\n                <\/p>\n<p>While the covariance of DZ twin pairs is equal to:<\/p>\n<p>$${\\sigma }_{{DZ},{DZ}}=0.5 * {\\sigma }_{A}^{2}+0.25 * {\\sigma }_{D}^{2}+{\\sigma }_{C}^{2}$$<\/p>\n<p>\n                    (2)\n                <\/p>\n<p>Given that the variance and covariance are measured between twins within families, it is possible to specify a multigroup structural equation model and estimate three out of four variance components. The decision of which parameters to include in the model (e.g., A, C, E, or A, D, E) is purely based on twin covariances, which are extracted from the constrained saturated model phenotypic model (see below), and biological plausibility. If \u03c3MZ, MZ\u2009&gt;\u20092*\u03c3DZ,DZ, then D is expected to contribute to the phenotypic variance and, therefore, an ADE model is specified. Otherwise, an ACE model is fit to the data.<\/p>\n<p>CTD assumptions<\/p>\n<p>The estimates from the CTD are unbiased under a set of assumptions. First, the CTD assumes equal environments between the twins. In other words, it assumes that similarities between twins caused by the environment are the same for both zygosities. Suppose, instead, MZ twins experience their environment more similarly than DZ twins due to environmental, not genetic, causes. In that case, the estimate for the genetic variance will be upwardly biased (i.e., \\(\\widehat{{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{{{\\rm{A}}}}^{2}}\\)\u2009&gt;\u2009\u03c3A2). Note that the equal environment assumption is not violated if MZ twins experience their environment more similarly than DZ twins due to genetic differences. The second assumption is that the phenotypes of the parents of the twins are uncorrelated (i.e., random mating, also known as panmixia<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 80\" title=\"Falconer, D. S. &amp; Mackay, T. F. C. Introduction to Quantitative Genetics 4th Edition, (Pearson Education Ltd, Essex, 1996).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR80\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e3136\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">80<\/a>). If the covariance between two parental phenotypes, p1 and p2, is different from 0, \u03c3P1,P2 \\(\\ne\\) 0, then the shared environmental variance might be upwardly biased (i.e., \\(\\widehat{{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{{{\\rm{C}}}}^{2}}\\)\u2009&gt;\u2009\u03c3C2). The third assumption is that there are no gene-environment interactions or gene-environment passive correlations. Based on the type of gene-environment interaction or correlation, different sources of bias are expected. If AxC is present, then \\(\\widehat{{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{{{\\rm{A}}}}^{2}}\\)\u2009&gt;\u2009\u03c3A2 is expected. If AxE is present instead\u00a0\\(\\widehat{{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{{{\\rm{E}}}}^{2}}\\)\u2009&gt;\u2009\u03c3E2. If passive rG,E is present, then \\(\\widehat{{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{{{\\rm{C}}}}^{2}}\\)\u2009&gt;\u2009\u03c3C2 is expected. An additional set of assumptions introduced when estimating parameters via SEM is that means and variances are equal across zygosity group, twin order (i.e., 1 and 2), and sex. Details on the latter set of assumptions are given below. Complex sources of upward or downward biases in CTD-informed models (e.g., heterogeneity) are discussed elsewhere<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 81\" title=\"Wray, N. R. &amp; Maier, R. Genetic basis of complex genetic disease: the contribution of disease heterogeneity to missing heritability. Curr. Epidemiol. Rep. 1, 220&#x2013;227 (2014).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR81\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e3369\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">81<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Saturated model<\/p>\n<p>We first fit multigroup SEM models to create a baseline against which to compare the fit of univariate and multivariate models and test for the assumptions of the equality of mean and variances. The models freely estimated all the observed variance and covariances and included the age of the twins as a covariate. For the univariate model, equality of means and variances was tested by sequentially constraining parameters and comparing the Akaike Information Criterion (AIC) and Bayesian Information Criterion (BIC) of the models, where AIC\u2009=\u20092k\u2009\u2013\u20092ln(\\(\\widehat{{{\\rm{L}}}}\\)) and BIC\u2009=\u2009kln(k)\u2009\u2013\u20092ln(\\(\\widehat{{{\\rm{L}}}}\\)), with k being the number of parameters estimated in the model and \\(\\widehat{{{\\rm{L}}}}\\) the maximised value of the likelihood function. Models with smaller AIC and BIC were deemed a good fit. Additional comparisons are provided by the likelihood-ratio test (LRT), using the lavaan::lavTestLRT() function from the lavaan R package<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 82\" title=\"Rosseel, Y. lavaan: an R package for structural equation modeling. J. Stat. Softw. 48, 1&#x2013;36 (2012).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR82\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e3473\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">82<\/a>. All models were specified following lavaan notation and fitted with the lavaan::sem() function.<\/p>\n<p>Univariate variance decomposition<\/p>\n<p>The SEM specification was informed by the CTD, following the pattern of twin pairs correlations extracted from the SEM model selected after model comparison results. Twin pairs correlations were extracted using the most parsimonious constrained saturated model using the lavaan::standardizedSoultion() function. Precisely, we fit a five-group ADE SEM model, where the five groups were formed by either full or incomplete MZ women, MZ men, DZ women, DZ men, and DZ opposite-sex pairs. Means for women and men were estimated freely across sex, but not across zygosities or twin order. We fit the model via the direct symmetric approach by directly estimating the variances, as it can derive asymptotically unbiased parameter estimates and is, therefore, less prone to type I errors<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 83\" title=\"Verhulst, B., Prom-Wormley, E., Keller, M., Medland, S. &amp; Neale, M. C. Type I error rates and parameter bias in multivariate behavioral genetic models. Behav. Genet. 49, 99&#x2013;111 (2019).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR83\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e3485\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">83<\/a>. We then decomposed the variance-covariance matrix <b>T<\/b> of twin pairs into the <b>T<\/b>\u2009=\u2009<b>A<\/b>\u2009+\u2009<b>D<\/b>\u2009+\u2009<b>E<\/b> variance covariances, which was predicted as follows:<\/p>\n<p>$${{\\bf{T}}}=\\left[\\begin{array}{cc}{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A}^{2}{+{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{D}^{2}{+{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{E}^{2} &amp; {r}_{\\alpha } * {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A}^{2}{+{r}_{{{\\rm{\\delta }}}} * {{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{D}^{2}\\\\ {{r}_{\\alpha } * {{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A}^{2}{+{r}_{{{\\rm{\\delta }}}} * {{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{D}^{2} &amp; {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A}^{2}{+{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{D}^{2}{+{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{E}^{2}\\end{array}\\right]$$<\/p>\n<p>\n                    (3)\n                <\/p>\n<p>Where r\u03b1 is the expected additive genetic relationship, and r\u03b4 is the expected dominant genetic relationship between pairs (i.e., r\u03b1\u2009=\u20091 or 0.5, r\u03b4\u2009=\u20091 or 0.25, for MZ and DZ, respectively). Note that for simplicity, here we exclude the contribution of age to <b>T<\/b>, which was instead included in the model. To test for the significance of the variance components A and D, we additionally fit two models where D and AD variances were constrained to 0. Significance was inferred by model comparison, as above. We fit the model to the raw sum score of the BMRQ using the lavaan::sem() function. Assuming data within pairs were missing at random, we used the recommended estimator for twin data analysis, the full-information maximum likelihood (FIML; argument estimator\u2009=\u2009\u201cML\u201d). We used the following estimator for the heritability:<\/p>\n<p>$${h}_{{twin}}^{2}=\\frac{{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A}^{2}}{{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A}^{2}+{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{E}^{2}}$$<\/p>\n<p>\n                    (4)\n                <\/p>\n<p>Here we note the detail that \u03c3A2\u2009+\u2009\u03c3E2 \\(\\ne\\) \u03c3P2, as \u03c3P2\u2009=\u2009\u03c3A2\u2009+\u2009\u03c3E2\u2009+\u2009B2*\u03c3Age2. We also note that, since the E component includes residual deviation, \u03c3E2\u2009=\u2009inter-\u03c3E2\u2009+\u2009intra-\u03c3E2, where inter-\u03c3E2 is the inter-individual variance, and intra-\u03c3E2 is the intra-individual variance<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 80\" title=\"Falconer, D. S. &amp; Mackay, T. F. C. Introduction to Quantitative Genetics 4th Edition, (Pearson Education Ltd, Essex, 1996).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR80\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e4022\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">80<\/a>. Comparisons with standard OpenMX protocols are given in Supplementary Note\u00a0<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-track-action=\"supplementary material anchor\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#MOESM1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">7<\/a> (note that the small differences in test statistics did not lead to different conclusions). A graphical representation of the full univariate multigroup model can be found in Supplementary Fig.\u00a0<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-track-action=\"supplementary material anchor\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#MOESM1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">3<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Cholesky decomposition<\/p>\n<p>We applied a Cholesky decomposition to SMDT, BAS-RR, and BMRQ twin data<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 84\" title=\"Neale, M. C. &amp; Cardon, L. R. Multivariate analysis. In Methodology for Genetic Studies of Twins and Families (eds. Neale, M. C. &amp; Cardon, L. R.) 231&#x2013;259 (Springer Netherlands, Dordrecht, 1992).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR84\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e4040\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">84<\/a>. Following the CTD, we specified a multivariate model to estimate path (e.g., \u03bbA1 and \u03bbE1) and cross-path (e.g., \u03bbA12 and \u03bbE12) coefficients. The predicted 6\u2009\u00d7\u20096 <b>S<\/b> symmetric matrix included the within-twin variance covariances on the <b>S<\/b>1:3,1:3 and <b>S<\/b>4:6,4:6 elements and the between-twin variance covariances on the <b>S<\/b>4:6,1:3 and <b>S<\/b>1:3,4:6 elements. The within-twin variance-covariance matrices were obtained as <b>A<\/b><b>w<\/b>\u2009=\u2009<b>XX<\/b>T or <b>E<\/b><b>w<\/b>\u2009=\u2009<b>ZZ<\/b>T, where <b>X<\/b> and <b>Z<\/b> are the lower triangular matrices with the path (on the diagonal) and cross-path (on the off-diagonal) coefficients for the additive genetic and environmental components, respectively. The between-twin variance-covariance <b>A<\/b><b>b<\/b> matrix was obtained similarly but considered the expected additive genetic correlations, r\u03b1, between MZ or DZ twins. The sequence of variables was purely chosen to regress out A1 and A2, and E1 and E2, respectively, implied from SMDT and BAS-RR observed scores from the BMRQ. To estimate an adjusted heritability (here, for simplicity, adj-htwin<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 2\" title=\"Koelsch, S. Brain correlates of music-evoked emotions. Nat. Rev. Neurosci. 15, 170&#x2013;180 (2014).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR2\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e4137\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">2<\/a>), we calculated the proportion of variance of the BMRQ covarying with the component A over the total BMRQ variance (minus the variance in BMRQ covarying with age):<\/p>\n<p>$${{adj}-h}_{{twin}}^{2}=\\frac{{\\lambda }_{A3}^{2}}{({\\lambda }_{A3}^{2}+{\\lambda }_{E3}^{2})+({\\lambda }_{A13}^{2}+{\\lambda }_{E13}^{2}+{\\lambda }_{A23}^{2}+{\\lambda }_{E23}^{2})}$$<\/p>\n<p>\n                    (5)\n                <\/p>\n<p>Where the numerical subscripts simply indicate the order of the phenotype in the model (e.g., 3 is the BMRQ). To calculate the amount of additive genetic variance unique and associated with BMRQ beyond SMDT and BAS-RR (\u03c3Au:At2; u\u2009=\u2009unique, t\u2009=\u2009total), we computed the proportion of genetic variance over the total BMRQ additive genetic variance as follows:<\/p>\n<p>$${{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{{Au}:{At}}^{2}=\\frac{{\\lambda }_{A3}^{2}}{({\\lambda }_{A3}^{2})+({\\lambda }_{A13}^{2}+{\\lambda }_{A23}^{2})}$$<\/p>\n<p>\n                    (6)\n                <\/p>\n<p>A graphical representation of the full multivariate model can be found in Supplementary Fig.\u00a0<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-track-action=\"supplementary material anchor\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#MOESM1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">5<\/a>. Similar to what was reported above, we fit the models using the lavaan::sem() function (estimator \u201cML\u201d) but to standardised variables and latent components. We used LRT for the significance of the \u03bb coefficient, where the full model was compared to a model in which any tested \u03bb coefficient was set to be equal to 0.<\/p>\n<p>Distinct factor solution<\/p>\n<p>To estimate the genetic and environmental correlations between facets of music reward, we applied a correlated factor model via a direct symmetric approach<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 83\" title=\"Verhulst, B., Prom-Wormley, E., Keller, M., Medland, S. &amp; Neale, M. C. Type I error rates and parameter bias in multivariate behavioral genetic models. Behav. Genet. 49, 99&#x2013;111 (2019).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR83\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e4556\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">83<\/a> (referred to as a distinct factor solution). The direct symmetric approach is conceptually similar to a correlated factor solution. In the correlated factor solution, the multivariate phenotypic variance-covariance matrix <b>M<\/b> is obtained as <b>M<\/b>\u2009\u2009=\u2009\u2009<b>A<\/b>\u2009+\u2009<b>E<\/b> (in the simplest case of an AE model), with <b>A<\/b>\u2009=\u2009<b>XR<\/b>A<b>X<\/b>T and <b>E<\/b>\u2009=\u2009<b>ZR<\/b>E<b>Z<\/b>T, where <b>X<\/b> and <b>Z<\/b> are the diagonal matrix of the standard deviation \u03c3A and \u03c3E and <b>R<\/b>A is the genetic correlation matrix. Within a direct symmetric approach, instead, a different parametrisation is specified to directly estimate the <b>M<\/b> 10\u2009\u00d7\u200910 symmetric matrix as <b>M<\/b>\u2009=\u2009<b>A<\/b>\u2009+\u2009<b>E<\/b>:<\/p>\n<p>$${{\\bf{M}}}=\\left[\\begin{array}{ccccc}{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A1}^{2}+{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{E1}^{2} &amp; {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A1,A2}+{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{E1,E2} &amp; \\cdots &amp; {r}_{\\alpha } * {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A1,A4} &amp; {r}_{\\alpha } * {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A1,A5}\\\\ {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A1,A2}+{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{E1,E2} &amp; {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A2}^{2}+{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{E2}^{2} &amp; \\vdots &amp; {r}_{\\alpha } * {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A2,A4} &amp; {r}_{\\alpha } * {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A2,A5}\\\\ \\vdots &amp; \\vdots &amp; \\ddots &amp; \\vdots &amp; \\vdots \\\\ {r}_{\\alpha } * {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A1,A4} &amp; {r}_{\\alpha } * {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A2,A4} &amp; \\vdots &amp; {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A4}^{2}+{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{E4}^{2} &amp; \\vdots {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A4,A5}+{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{E4,E5}\\\\ {r}_{\\alpha } * {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A1,A5} &amp; {r}_{\\alpha } * {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A2,A5} &amp; \\cdots &amp; {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A4,A5}+{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{E4,E5} &amp; {{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{A5}^{2}+{{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{E5}^{2}\\end{array}\\right]$$<\/p>\n<p>\n                    (7)\n                <\/p>\n<p>Where the <b>M<\/b>1:5,1:5 and <b>M<\/b>5:10,5:10 elements include the within-twin variance and between-traits covariances and are constrained to be equal across zygosities, and the M5:10,1:5 and M1:5,5:10 elements include the between-twin additive genetic within- and between-trait covariances and the expected additive genetic relationship r\u03b1, which is fixed to either 1 or 0.5 in MZ and DZ groups, respectively. While this approach may return out-of-bound values, the absence of boundaries has been shown to yield asymptotically unbiased parameter estimates and correct type I and type II error rates<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 83\" title=\"Verhulst, B., Prom-Wormley, E., Keller, M., Medland, S. &amp; Neale, M. C. Type I error rates and parameter bias in multivariate behavioral genetic models. Behav. Genet. 49, 99&#x2013;111 (2019).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR83\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e5437\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">83<\/a>. A graphical representation of the full multivariate model can be found in Supplementary Fig.\u00a0<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-track-action=\"supplementary material anchor\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#MOESM1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">6<\/a>. Model syntax was written following lavaan specifications. Model fitting was done via the lavaan: sem() function (estimator \u201cML\u201d). In sum, the distinct factor solution provides a multivariate model for the decomposition of phenotypic variances and covariances in genetic and environmental components. Comparison of this model with more parsimonious independent pathway models allows us to test for the presence of a shared genetic (or environmental) component shared across facets.<\/p>\n<p>Shared-genetic factor solution<\/p>\n<p>The hybrid-independent genetic pathway model (referred to here as shared-genetic factor solution) is a multivariate approach similar to the correlated factor solution, except with an additional restriction on the genetic covariances between traits (\u03c3A,A; hence hybrid or genetic, as environmental covariances are modelled in a distinct factor solution fashion). Consider a 5\u2009\u00d7\u20095 phenotypic variance-covariance matrix <b>P<\/b>. Under an AE shared-genetic factor solution, <b>P<\/b> can be written as <b>P<\/b>\u2009=\u2009<b>A<\/b><b>s<\/b>\u2009+\u2009<b>A<\/b><b>u<\/b>\u2009+\u2009<b>E<\/b>, where <b>A<\/b><b>s<\/b>\u2009=\u2009<b>X<\/b><b>s<\/b><b>X<\/b><b>s<\/b>T, with <b>X<\/b>s being a 5\u2009\u00d7\u20091 vector of the additive genetic path coefficients of a shared additive genetic factor (AC) loading across all phenotypes, and <b>A<\/b>u is a 5\u2009\u00d7\u20095 diagonal matrix including the residual unique genetic variance for each phenotype, \u03c3Au2. The full additive genetic variance-covariance matrix can be then as follows:<\/p>\n<p>$${{{\\bf{A}}}}_{{{\\bf{t}}}}={{{\\bf{X}}}}_{{{\\bf{s}}}}{{{\\bf{X}}}}_{s}^{T}+{{{\\bf{A}}}}_{{{\\bf{u}}}}=\\left[\\begin{array}{ccccc}{{{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A1}^{2}+{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{{Au}1}^{2} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A1} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A2} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A1} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A3} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A1} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A4} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A1} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A5}\\\\ {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A1} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A2} &amp; {{{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A2}^{2}+{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{{Au}2}^{2} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A2} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A3} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A2} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A4} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A2} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A5}\\\\ {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A1} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A3} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A2} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A3} &amp; {{{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A3}^{2}+{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{{Au}3}^{2} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A3} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A4} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A3} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A5}\\\\ {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A1} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A4} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A2} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A4} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A3} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A4} &amp; {{{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{41}^{2}+{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{{Au}4}^{2} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A4} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A5}\\\\ {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A1} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A5} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A2} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A5} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A3} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A5} &amp; {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A4} * {{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A5} &amp; {{{{\\boldsymbol{\\lambda }}}}_{A5}^{2}+{{\\rm{\\sigma }}}}_{{Au}5}^{2}\\end{array}\\right]$$<\/p>\n<p>\n                    (8)\n                <\/p>\n<p>The 5\u2009\u00d7\u20095 residual environmental covariance <b>E<\/b> simply contains the unconstrained residual environmental variances and covariances \u03c3E2 and \u03c3E,E. The 10\u2009\u00d7\u200910 twin variance-covariance matrix <b>M<\/b> can then be written as follows:<\/p>\n<p>$${{\\bf{M}}}=\\left[\\begin{array}{cc}{{{\\bf{A}}}}_{{{\\boldsymbol{t}}}}+{{\\bf{E}}} &amp; {{r}_{\\alpha } * {{\\bf{A}}}}_{{{\\boldsymbol{t}}}}\\\\ {{r}_{\\alpha } * {{\\bf{A}}}}_{{{\\boldsymbol{t}}}} &amp; {{{\\bf{A}}}}_{{{\\boldsymbol{t}}}}+{{\\bf{E}}}\\end{array}\\right]$$<\/p>\n<p>\n                    (9)\n                <\/p>\n<p>Where r\u03b1 is the expected additive genetic relationship between twins and is fixed to either 1 or 0.5 across MZ and DZ groups, respectively. A graphical representation of the full multivariate model can be found in Supplementary Fig.\u00a0<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-track-action=\"supplementary material anchor\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#MOESM1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">9<\/a>. Model syntax was written in lavaan. Model fitting was done via the lavaan:sem() function. Model comparison between distinct and shared-genetic factor solutions was carried out via the laavan:: lavTestLRT() function. Here, we additionally note that the shared-genetic factor solution is a less parsimonious version of the more commonly used independent pathway model and, therefore, provides a less restrictive and more specific test for a genetic shared factor when compared to the distinct factor solution.<\/p>\n<p>Shared-environmental factor solution<\/p>\n<p>The hybrid-independent environmental pathway model (the shared-environmental factor solution) is a multivariate approach similar to the hybrid-independent genetic pathway model. The 10\u2009\u00d7\u200910 matrix <b>M<\/b> can then be written as follows:<\/p>\n<p>$${{\\bf{M}}}=\\left[\\begin{array}{cc}{{\\bf{A}}}+{{{\\bf{E}}}}_{{{\\boldsymbol{t}}}} &amp; {r}_{\\alpha } * {{\\bf{A}}}\\\\ {r}_{\\alpha } * {{\\bf{A}}} &amp; {{\\bf{A}}}+{{{\\bf{E}}}}_{{{\\boldsymbol{t}}}}\\end{array}\\right]$$<\/p>\n<p>\n                    (10)\n                <\/p>\n<p>Where <b>E<\/b><b>t<\/b>\u2009=\u2009<b>E<\/b><b>s<\/b>\u2009+\u2009<b>E<\/b><b>u<\/b>, with <b>E<\/b><b>s<\/b>\u2009=\u2009<b>Z<\/b><b>s<\/b><b>Z<\/b><b>s<\/b>T, <b>Z<\/b>s being a 5\u2009\u00d7\u20091 vector of the environmental path coefficients of a shared environmental (Es) loading across all phenotypes, and <b>E<\/b>u the 5\u2009\u00d7\u20095 diagonal matrix including the residual environmental variance for each phenotype, \u03c3Eu2.<\/p>\n<p>Six-variate distinct factor solution<\/p>\n<p>We extended the previous five-variate distinct factor solution including either music perceptual abilities or general reward sensitivity. This model allowed us to estimate the genetic and environmental correlations between music perceptual abilities or general reward sensitivity and the five facets of music reward sensitivity. To test for the significance of the differences between genetic or environmental overlap between facets, we compared the full six-variate model with a model in which any of the tested pairwise genetic or environmental covariances were set to be equal. Model comparisons were carried out via the laavan:: lavTestLRT() function.<\/p>\n<p>Structural equation modelling assumptions<\/p>\n<p>SEM-based estimates obtained from the full-information maximum likelihood (FIML) estimator are unbiased under the assumption that observations follow a multivariate normal distribution<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 42\" title=\"Finney, S. J. &amp; DiStefano, C. Nonnormal and categorical data in structural equation modeling. In Structural Equation Modeling: A Second Course 2nd edn 439&#x2013;492 (IAP Information Age Publishing, Charlotte, NC, USA, 2013).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR42\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e6992\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">42<\/a>. Violation of the assumption of multivariate normality has been found to have little impact on parameter estimates but can have severe consequences for both the \u03c72 test statistics and the standard error of the estimates for the parameters. An alternative estimator that is less sensitive or robust to violation of multivariate normality is the maximum likelihood with robust standard error and scaled test statistics (MLR). Although this estimator assumes missingness to be completely at random, it has been shown to provide quite reliable estimates of data missing at random<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-action=\"reference anchor\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-test=\"citation-ref\" aria-label=\"Reference 85\" title=\"Yuan, K.-H. &amp; Bentler, P. M. 5. Three likelihood-based methods for mean and covariance structure analysis with nonnormal missing data. Sociol. Methodol. 30, 165&#x2013;200 (2000).\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#ref-CR85\" id=\"ref-link-section-d312735720e7000\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">85<\/a>. Relevant comparisons between the two estimators are given in Supplementary Note\u00a0<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-track-action=\"supplementary material anchor\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#MOESM1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">1<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Reporting summary<\/p>\n<p>Further information on research design is available in the\u00a0<a data-track=\"click\" data-track-label=\"link\" data-track-action=\"supplementary material anchor\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-58123-8#MOESM2\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Nature Portfolio Reporting Summary<\/a> linked to this article.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ethics Both waves of data collection (see below) were approved by the Regional Ethical Review Board in Stockholm&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":54784,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3846],"tags":[29111,267,29112,3965,3966,70,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-54783","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-genetics","8":"tag-behavioural-genetics","9":"tag-genetics","10":"tag-human-behaviour","11":"tag-humanities-and-social-sciences","12":"tag-multidisciplinary","13":"tag-science","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114410009824582325","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54783","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54783"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54783\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54784"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}