TwinLife Documentation

TwinLife Data Documentation

Information Website for Researchers

The TwinLife Data Documentation is intended to give both an overview of the longitudinal twin family study TwinLife and a short instruction on how to use the TwinLife data. It corresponds to the contents of the ➔Short Guide.

The following pages contain information about the project and links to various helpful documents that should facilitate the first steps into working with the TwinLife data. For a very quick description of everything you need to get started with the TwinLife Dataset see the Getting Started section below.

All additional documents of data documentation are provided in the downloads section.

For the scientific community, we installed this English data documentation website, where all important information about Twinlife can be found. Please use the content navigation on the left to find your way through the documentation, or use the search bar on the bottom left to find information on specific topics.

Under ➔ Publications, you can find an overview of all scientific publications known to us, which have been published around the TwinLife project or with the data of the project.

For a short overview of the Twinlife project you will find some basic information below. Clicking the headings will open the content.

TwinLife is a 12-year representative behavior genetic study investigating the development of social inequality.

The long-term project has begun in 2014 and surveyed more than 4,000 pairs of twins and their families by the first wave regarding their different stages of life on a yearly basis. Not only social, but also genetic mechanisms as well as covariations and interactions between these two parameters can be examined with the help of identical and fraternal twins.

In order to document the individual development of different parameters it is important to examine a family extensively over the course of several years. Six important contextual points are focused on: Education and academic performance, career and labour market attainment, integration and participation in social, cultural and political life, quality of life and perceived capabilities, physical and psychological health, and behavioral issues and deviant behavior. In the years 2020 and 2021, ➔ three additional surveys on the COVID-19 pandemic were conducted. Furthermore, from 2018 to 2024, ➔ three saliva samples were taken from the respondents, allowing for the collection of extensive (epi)genetic data. This way, the collected data can give insight into a multitude of questions concerning the development of social inequalities and will be made available to the scientific community.

Getting Started Downloads section Publications Study contents

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