To my knowledge no one has tested Cochran et al.’s prediction that Tay Sachs carriers will be have higher cognitive aptitudes than those who are non-Tay Sachs carriers all things controlled (i.e., compare sibs for instance). Before I went to sleep last night I started thinking about this, and I wondered if there was a quick & dirty way we could try to get a grip on the possibility of Tay Sachs vs. non-Tay Sachs cognitive performance. And I had a thought: a Jewish student organization at a very elite university could do a survey for Tay Sachs status amongst its members. Presumably Tay Sachs heterozygotes would be overrepresented 1-2 standard deviations above the Jewish American cognitive median.
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