New literacy challenge for the twenty-first century: genetic knowledge is poor even among well educated

Abstract

We live in an age of rapidly advancing genetic research. This research is generating new knowledge that has implications for personal health and well-being. The present study assessed the level of genetic knowledge and personal engagement with genetics in a large sample (N = 5404) of participants. Participants received secondary education in 78 countries, with the largest samples from Russia, the UK and the USA. The results showed significant group differences in genetic knowledge between different countries, professions, education levels and religious affiliations. Overall, genetic knowledge was poor. The questions were designed to assess basic genetic literacy. However, only 1.2% of participants answered all 18 questions correctly, and the average score was 65.5%. Genetic knowledge was related to peoples' attitudes towards genetics. For example, those with greater genetic knowledge were on average more willing to use genetic knowledge for their personal health management. Based on the results, the paper proposes a number of immediate steps that societies can implement to empower the public to benefit from ever-advancing genetic knowledge.

Genetic Knowledge within a National Australian Sample: Comparisons with Other Diverse Populations

“…Therefore, in the current sample, it appears that interest and understanding of genetics are better independent predictors of genetic knowledge than educational attainment. This finding falls in line with previous findings [14], which found poor genetic knowledge even among educated individuals across different cultures. This finding may be explained by the accessibility of genetic information from multiple sources.…”

“…For example, data suggest that knowledge of genetics was overall poor in countries like Russia, the UK, and the US [14], whereas it was considered moderate in Western Australia [13]. Furthermore, substantial variation in accuracy has been found between individual items within a specific study, with differences as large as 60% across items [10-12].…”

“…However, the roles of age, gender, and country of origin are less clear. In some instances younger people showed better knowledge than older respondents [10, 12], but age does not always predict differences on specific genetic knowledge items [11, 14]. Some studies showed females as scoring higher on genetic knowledge than males [11, 13] or vice versa [14], whereas no gender differences were detected in others [12].…”

“…Surprisingly, current awareness and potential misconceptions of genetic concepts within the general public have received limited attention in the literature. Whereas some attempts to document levels of genetic knowledge (the ability to identify correct facts about genetics) within populations have been made [10-13], only few studies explore variations in such knowledge over time and across geographical divides [14]. …”

Attitudes toward the right to autonomous decision‐making in psychiatric genetic testing: Controversial and context‐dependent

“…This finding supports previous research, which suggests that the duty of care of the study physician is often perceived by research subjects as an implicit aspect of the study physician‐study participant relationship (Bunnik, Schermer, & Janssens, ; Burke et al, ). This points to the problem that, in general, the level of understanding about genetic research among individuals from the general population might be not very high (Chapman et al, ; McGill et al, ), and, thus, the decision to override the right of the research participant or test person of autonomous decision‐making in order to disclose genetic findings (of clinical importance) may prove a difficult and time‐consuming undertaking.…”