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Age- and Sex-differences in the Validity of Questionnaire-based Zygosity in Twins

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 February 2012

Lene Christiansen ,
Henrik Frederiksen ,
Karoline Schousboe ,
Axel Skytthe ,
Nicole von Wurmb-Schwark ,
Kaare Christensen  and
Kirsten Kyvik
Lene Christiansen*
Affiliation:
The Danish Twin Registry, Institute of Public Health, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark. [email protected]
Henrik Frederiksen
Affiliation:
The Danish Twin Registry, Institute of Public Health, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark.
Karoline Schousboe
Affiliation:
The Danish Twin Registry, Institute of Public Health, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark.
Axel Skytthe
Affiliation:
The Danish Twin Registry, Institute of Public Health, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark.
Nicole von Wurmb-Schwark
Affiliation:
Institute of Legal Medicine, Kiel, Germany.
Kaare Christensen
Affiliation:
The Danish Twin Registry, Institute of Public Health, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark.
Kirsten Kyvik
Affiliation:
The Danish Twin Registry, Institute of Public Health, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark.
*
*Address for correspondence: Lene Christiansen, MSc, Ph.D., The Danish Twin Registry, Epidemiology, Institute of Public Health, University of Southern Denmark, Sdr. Boulevard 23A, DK-5000 Odense C, Denmark.

Abstract

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Questionnaire-based zygosity assessment in twins has generally been found to be valid. In this report we evaluate sex- and age-differences in the validity of such questionnairebased classification when using the four questions that have been the basis of zygosity assessment in The Danish Twin Registry for half a century. Three hundred and forty-two male and 531 female twin pairs were zygosity diagnosed using genetic markers and the results compared with the original questionnaire based classification. We found significant differences in the accuracy of questionnaire based zygosity diagnosis when stratifying the data for sex as well as age: males and monozygotic having the highest misclassification. However, even in the group with the highest misclassification rate the frequency was less than 8%. The overall misclassification rate was only 4%, with a clear tendency towards a higher proportion of misclassified monozygotic than dizygotic twins. The results demonstrate that questionnaire based zygosity diagnosis can still be regarded as a valid and valuable classification method for most purposes.

Type
Articles
Information
Twin Research and Human Genetics , Volume 6 , Issue 4 , 01 August 2003 , pp. 275 - 278
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2003