A New Study Correlates Genetics With Poor Driving Skills.
The study was published in the Cerebral Cortex Journal and says people with a certain gene variant related to activity perform far worse on driving tests than those without the gene variant.
Ordinarily, when a person performs a task, a protein called brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) is secreted to the part of the brain that is associated with that activity. But, in people who have the gene variation, BDNF secretion is limited, which slows communication among brain cells and decreases memory retention.
Turns out, 30% of Americans have the gene variant. Does this explain the high number of traffic collisions in the US?
Well, maybe, but there is no data available to show whether the accident rate is higher for drivers with the gene variant. So bad driving skills, while perhaps linked to genetics, is still no excuse for causing a car accident.
