Markers / Gene
OXTR
One position in this gene is readable from a home DNA test.
OXTR, the ‘empathy gene’, and why we grade it as weak
rs53576 · chr3:8,804,371 · A/G · evidence: preliminary
This sits in the oxytocin receptor gene and has been reported to relate to empathy, parenting, optimism and social sensitivity. It is one of the most cited variants in popular psychology.
| If you carry | What it means |
|---|---|
| No copies | Two A copies, the group that scored slightly lower in the original reports |
| One copy | One of each, the middle group |
| Two copies | Two G copies, the group that scored slightly higher in the original reports |
| Ancestry group | G (the effect version) | |
|---|---|---|
| African | 80.6% | |
| American | 64.4% | |
| East Asian | 35.0% | |
| European | 64.9% | |
| South Asian | 55.1% |
1000 Genomes Project phase 3, via Ensembl, retrieved 2026-09-23. These groupings are coarse and flatten a great deal of internal diversity, particularly within Africa. A variant being common somewhere tells you where a piece of your ancestry probably comes from, and nothing else.
If you have taken a home DNA test, these positions are already in your file.
Read my file