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Published January 1, 2015 | Version v1
Journal article Open

Zygosity Differences in Height and Body Mass Index of Twins From Infancy to Old Age: A Study of the CODATwins Project

Creators

  • 1. Osaka City Univ, Dept Publ Hlth Nursing, Osaka 558, Japan
  • 2. Univ Helsinki, Dept Social Res, FIN-00014 Helsinki, Finland
  • 3. Osaka Univ, Osaka Univ Grad Sch Med, Osaka, Japan
  • 4. Univ Helsinki, Dept Publ Hlth, FIN-00014 Helsinki, Finland
  • 5. Qingdao Ctr Dis Control & Prevent, Dept Noncommunicable Dis Prevent, Qingdao, Peoples R China
  • 6. Michigan State Univ, E Lansing, MI 48824 USA
  • 7. QIMR Berghofer Med Res Inst, Brisbane, Qld, Australia
  • 8. Univ Bielefeld, Dept Psychol, D-33615 Bielefeld, Germany
  • 9. Kings Coll London, Inst Psychiat Psychol & Neurosci, MRC Social Genet & Dev Psychiat Ctr, London WC2R 2LS, England
  • 10. Univ London, Dept Psychol, London, England

Description

A trend toward greater body size in dizygotic (DZ) than in monozygotic (MZ) twins has been suggested by some but not all studies, and this difference may also vary by age. We analyzed zygosity differences in mean values and variances of height and body mass index (BMI) among male and female twins from infancy to old age. Data were derived from an international database of 54 twin cohorts participating in the COllaborative project of Development of Anthropometrical measures in Twins (CODATwins), and included 842,951 height and BMI measurements from twins aged 1 to 102 years. The results showed that DZ twins were consistently taller than MZ twins, with differences of up to 2.0 cm in childhood and adolescence and up to 0.9 cm in adulthood. Similarly, a greater mean BMI of up to 0.3 kg/m(2) in childhood and adolescence and up to 0.2 kg/m(2) in adulthood was observed in DZ twins, although the pattern was less consistent. DZ twins presented up to 1.7% greater height and 1.9% greater BMI than MZ twins; these percentage differences were largest in middle and late childhood and decreased with age in both sexes. The variance of height was similar in MZ and DZ twins at most ages. In contrast, the variance of BMI was significantly higher in DZ than in MZ twins, particularly in childhood. In conclusion, DZ twins were generally taller and had greater BMI than MZ twins, but the differences decreased with age in both sexes.

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