[kbenson]

So every trait can be heritable, but often they only are about half the time? To me, 49% seems kind of high, considering multiple parent, dominant and recessive traits, etc. Then again, I may not be interpreting heritability to mean the same thing as you meant in this context.

[azakai]

Heritability has a very precise definition in this context:

> Heritability is the proportion of observed differences on a trait among individuals of a population that are due to genetic differences. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heritability

It is also commonly misunderstood. In particular, heritability is always relative to an environment, and not independent from it. Height might be 50% heritable in one area but 75% heritable in another, for example (even with the same genetic population in both areas).

[danieltillett]

Yes you can’t compare heritability between populations only within populations.

The other big misunderstanding is that environment means the contribution of family or society. It is really just everything that is not genetic and is mostly noise. When you try to measure the effects of family background on most personality traits the contribution is close to zero.