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A Comparison of Educational Achievement in a National Sample of Dutch Female Twins and Their Matched Singleton Controls

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 February 2012

Celina C.C. Cohen ,
Stephanie H. M. van Goozen ,
Jacob F. Orlebeke ,
Jan K. Buitelaar  and
Peggy T. Cohen-Kettenis
Celina C.C. Cohen*
Affiliation:
Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University Medical Centre Utrecht, and the Rudolf Magnus Institute for Neurosciences, The Netherlands. c.cohen@psych.azu.nl
Stephanie H. M. van Goozen
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.
Jacob F. Orlebeke
Affiliation:
Department of Biological Psychology, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Jan K. Buitelaar
Affiliation:
Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University Medical Centre Utrecht, and the Rudolf Magnus Institute for Neurosciences, The Netherlands.
Peggy T. Cohen-Kettenis
Affiliation:
Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University Medical Centre Utrecht, and the Rudolf Magnus Institute for Neurosciences, The Netherlands.
*
*Address of correspondences: Celina Cohen M.Sc, Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, A01.468, University Medical Centre Utrecht, P.O. Box 85500, 3508 GA Utrecht, The Netherlands.

Abstract

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The aim of this study was to compare the educational achievement of female twins (n = 577) and their matched singleton controls (n = 447), who were selected from participants of a national test of educational achievement in the years 1993 to 1998. To assure the representativeness of the selected groups we also compared the achievement scores of the twins and the controls to those of the total Dutch female population tested in the same period. We analyzed the results of the following educational achievement scales: Language, Mathematics and Information Processing. The results indicated that the singleton classmates performed significantly better than the twins on all three scales. However, the twins performed equally well as compared to the Dutch female population. We believe that our singleton control group was not as properly selected as we intended, a selection bias operative at the level of the schools may have confounded the comparison. We therefore conclude on the basis of a comparison with the performance of the total Dutch female population that there are no differences in educational achievement between female twins and singletons.

Type
Articles
Information
Twin Research and Human Genetics , Volume 5 , Issue 4 , 01 August 2002 , pp. 273 - 276
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2002