information for practice

As part of a strategy to determine how best to integrate research priorities to include an increased focus on the impact on health of interactions among social, behavioral, and genetic factors, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research, in conjunction with the National Human Genome Research Institute and the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, requested that the Institute of Medicine undertake a study to examine the state of the science on geneenvironment interactions that affect human health, with a focus on the social environment. The goal of the study was to identify approaches and strategies to strengthen the integration of social, behavioral, and genetic research and to consider the relevant training and infrastructure needs.