rs10186870 (LINC01824): Educational Attainment SNP

Key takeaways

• rs10186870 lies within the LINC01824 / MIR7515HG non-coding RNA region and was identified as genome-wide significant for educational attainment in one of the largest genetic studies to date (approximately 3 million participants).
• It is one of 3,952 independent variants tied to educational attainment in this study; no individual effect size for rs10186870 is available in the provided study text.
• A polygenic index built from all 3,952 associated variants explains 12 to 16 percent of variance in educational attainment across held-out validation samples.
• After accounting for parental genetics, direct effects explain roughly half the polygenic index's predictive association with educational attainment and other traits.
• Couples share more similar polygenic profiles for educational attainment than expected from matching on education level alone, suggesting assortative mating on additional related factors.

What the research says rs10186870 is located within LINC01824 (Long Intergenic Non-Protein Coding RNA 1824) and MIR7515HG (the host gene for microRNA 7515), two non-coding RNA genes. The variant was among 3,952 approximately uncorrelated genome-wide-significant single-nucleotide polymorphisms (single-letter differences in the DNA sequence, also called SNPs) identified in a genome-wide association study (GWAS, a method that tests hundreds of thousands of genetic variants across many people to find statistical links with a trait) of educational attainment (EA) spanning approximately 3,037,499 individuals. A polygenic index (a score that sums the small contributions of many variants) built from these signals explains 12 to 16 percent of variance in EA across validation samples, roughly a 20 percent improvement over the prior study in the same research series. Direct effects, estimated within families by controlling for parental polygenic indices, account for roughly half that association with this trait and other phenotypes, while mate-pair polygenic index correlations were far larger than expected from phenotypic assortment alone.

Reported associations

• Educational attainment (years of schooling completed): Listed among 3,952 genome-wide-significant variants for EA in a GWAS of approximately 3,037,499 individuals; no individual effect size for rs10186870 is reported in the available study text.

Evidence quality The association originates from the EA4 meta-analysis (a combined analysis pooling results from multiple cohorts), the fourth and largest iteration of this research program, with approximately 3,037,499 participants. The series has grown from roughly 126,559 individuals in the first iteration to the current scale, with the polygenic index R-squared (the percentage of variance explained) rising from approximately 2.6 percent to 12 to 16 percent over that period. The mean test statistic for the autosomal EA4 GWAS was 4.90, reflecting a well-powered study. No individual effect size for rs10186870 is provided in the available study text, and no dedicated replication for this specific variant is described. A dominance analysis (testing whether carrying two copies of a variant differs from the additive prediction) identified no genome-wide-significant signals for any EA variant, suggesting the additive model fits well across this trait. Because educational attainment reflects environmental, cultural, and socioeconomic factors in addition to genetics, the biological interpretation of any single EA-associated variant, including this locus, remains preliminary and should be interpreted with caution.

Lifestyle considerations No lifestyle considerations on file for this variant.