Plomin was born in Chicago to a family of Polish-German extraction.[3] In a 2014 interview with The Guardian, he recalled being suspended temporarily from elementary school for arguing about evolution with a teacher, an experience he said pushed him toward a scientific worldview and away from religion.[4]
From 1986 to 1994, Plomin served as Professor of Human Development at Pennsylvania State University, where he directed the Center for Developmental and Health Genetics and participated in the Intercollege Graduate Program in Genetics. In 1994, he was named an Evan Pugh Professor, the highest honor given to faculty at Penn State.[6]
In 1994, Plomin relocated to the United Kingdom and joined King’s College London as an MRC Research Professor in Behavioral Genetics. He founded the Social, Genetic and Developmental Psychiatry Centre (SGDP) at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience.[7] He served as Deputy Director (1994–2007), Director (2007–2010), and again as Deputy Director (2010–2020) of the Centre.[5]
At King’s College, Plomin led the Twins Early Development Study (TEDS). It was longitudinal project following over 15,000 pairs of twins born in the UK between 1994 and 1996. TEDS has been funded for a record 30 years by the UK Medical Research Council.[8][9]
Research
Two of Plomin’s highly cited papers used genetic research to uncover novel discoveries about the environment. The first was a 1987 paper with Denise Daniels, which summarized evidence that psychologically relevant environmental influences make children in a family different from, not similar to, one another.[10][11] These influences, called nonshared environment are in contrast to nurture, the assumption that shared family factors such as parenting are responsible for developmental outcomes.[12]
The second paper, published in 1991 with Cindy Bergeman, reviewed research that revealed substantial genetic influence on environmental measures widely used in psychology, which opened up a new known as the nature of nurture.[13][14] Genetic factors impact so-called environmental measures like parenting, life events and social support because they are not measures of the environment ‘out there’ independent of people. Instead, such environmental measures involve what geneticists call genotype-environment correlation, in which people select, modify and create experiences correlated with their genetic propensities.[15][16]
Generalist Genes Hypothesis
Together with Yulia Kovas and others, Plomin developed the Generalist Genes Hypothesis, which suggests that many of the same genes are involved across a range of cognitive abilities and learning disabilities.[17][18] This insight challenged the traditional view of distinct, domain-specific genetic pathways and has had a profound influence on educational psychology and the understanding of neurodevelopmental disorders.[19]
Polygenic Scores and Blueprint
Plomin has advocated incorporating molecular genetics into psychology, using genome-wide association studies to study how polygenic scores relate to behavioral and cognitive differences.[20] His 2018 book Blueprint: How DNA Makes Us Who We Are argues that inherited DNA is a major influence on individual traits and has received both praise and criticism, including concerns about genetic determinism.[21][22][23]
Behavioral Genetics in the Postgenomic Era, together with John C. DeFries, Peter McGuffin, Ian W. Craig, American Psychological Association, 2002, ISBN978-1-55798-926-0
Nature And Nurture: An Introduction To Human Behavioral Genetics, Wadsworth Publishing, 2004, ISBN978-0-534-65112-1
Nature and Nurture during Infancy and Early Childhood, together with John C. DeFries, David Fulker, Cambridge University Press, 2006, ISBN978-0-521-03424-1
Behavioral Genetics, together with John C. DeFries, Peter McGuffin, Gerald E. McClearn, Worth Publishers; 5th edition, 2008, ISBN978-1-4292-0577-1
Behavioral Genetics, together with John C. DeFries, Valerie S Knopik, Jenae M. Neiderhiser, Worth Publishers; 6th edition, 2012, ISBN978-1-4292-4215-8
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