Daniel Smith

University of Bristol | UB · Medical School

Abstract Background Neuroticism represents a personality disposition towards experiencing negative emotions more frequently and intensely. Longitudinal studies suggest that neuroticism increases risk of several psychological problems. Improved understanding of how this trait manifests in early life could help inform preventative strategies in those...

Quality of relationship between partners is associated with a wide range of physical and psychological outcomes like anxiety and depression. There are relatively few longitudinal studies with detailed and repeated measures for quality of relationship, particularly in both partners. The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a l...

Background: Structured life course modelling approaches (SLCMA) have been developed to understand how exposures across the lifespan relate to later health, but have primarily been restricted to single exposures. As multiple exposures can jointly impact health, here we: i) demonstrate how to extend SLCMA to include exposure interactions; ii) conduct...

Longitudinal data on religious/spiritual beliefs and behaviors (RSBB) are essential for understanding both how religion shapes our lives and the factors determining religiosity. Despite this importance, there are few longitudinal studies with detailed and repeated RSBB data. Using data spanning nearly 30 years from the parental generation of the Av...

Background : We explored associations between possible demographic and socioeconomic causes of religious/spiritual beliefs and behaviours (RSBB) in the parental generation of the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC). Methods : We used a prospective birth cohort study (ALSPAC) in Southwest England with 14,157 enrolled mothers and...

Background: Non-random selection of analytic subsamples could introduce selection bias in observational studies. We explored the potential presence and impact of selection in studies of SARS-CoV-2 infection and COVID-19 prognosis. Methods: We tested the association of a broad range of characteristics with selection into COVID-19 analytic subsamp...

Background: We explored associations between possible demographic and socioeconomic causes of religious/spiritual beliefs and behaviours (RSBB) in the offspring generation of the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC). Methods: We examined approximately 4,450 offspring aged 28 years with RSBB data from a prospective birth cohort s...

Women cooperate over multiple domains and while research from western contexts portrays women's networks as limited in size and breadth, women receive help, particularly with childcare, from a diverse range of individuals (allomothers). Nonetheless, little exploration has occurred into why we see such diversity. Wide maternal childcare networks may...

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a prospective birth cohort, based in and around Bristol, UK, established to explore genetic and environmental factors impacting health and development. 14,541 pregnancies were initially recruited from 20,248 eligible pregnancies. As the G1 offspring turned 7 years of age, children from...

Cultural effects can influence the results of causal genetic analyses, such as Mendelian randomisation, but the potential influences of culture on genotype–phenotype associations are not currently well understood. Different genetic variants could be associated with different phenotypes in different populations, or culture could confound or influenc...

Longitudinal data on religious/spiritual beliefs and behaviours (RSBB) are essential for understanding both how religion shapes our lives and the factors determining religiosity. Despite this importance, there are few longitudinal studies with detailed and repeated RSBB data. Using data spanning nearly 30 years from the parental generation of the A...

There is significant evidence from large-scale, industrial and post-industrial societies that greater inequality in income and wealth are negatively associated with both population health across multiple domains and increasing health inequalities. However, in high-income Western societies, it is difficult to disentangle the effects of wealth dispar...

Background Longitudinal studies are key to understanding risk factors for health, well-being, and disease, yet associations may be biased if study invitation and participation are non-random. Religious/spiritual beliefs and behaviours (RSBB) are increasingly recognised as having potentially important relationships with health. However, it is unclea...

Background: Longitudinal studies are crucial for identifying potential risk factors for infection with, and consequences of, COVID-19, but relationships can be biased if they are associated with invitation and response to data collection. We describe factors relating to questionnaire invitation and response in COVID-19 questionnaire data collection...

Background: This study explores whether differences in religious/spiritual beliefs and behaviours (RSBB) are associated with dietary patterns in the parental generation of the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC).Methods: 13,689 enrolled mothers and their associated partners from a prospective cohort study (ALSPAC) in Southwest...

Background : We explored associations between possible demographic and socioeconomic causes of religious/spiritual beliefs and behaviours (RSBB) in the parental generation of the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC). Methods: We used a prospective birth cohort study (ALSPAC) in Southwest England with 14,157 enrolled mothers and...

SARS-CoV-2 antibody levels can be used to assess humoral immune responses following SARS-CoV-2 infection or vaccination, and may predict risk of future infection. From cross-sectional antibody testing of 9,361 individuals from TwinsUK and ALSPAC UK population-based longitudinal studies (jointly in April-May 2021, and TwinsUK only in November 2021-J...

Background: SARS-CoV-2 antibody levels can be used to assess humoral immune responses following SARS-CoV-2 infection or vaccination, and may predict risk of future infection. Higher levels of SARS-CoV-2 anti-Spike antibodies are known to be associated with increased protection against future SARS-CoV-2 infection. However, variation in antibody leve...

Ancestral humans evolved a complex social structure still observed in extant hunter-gatherers. Here we investigate the effects of extensive sociality and mobility on the oral microbiome of 138 Agta hunter-gatherers from the Philippines. Comparisons of microbiome composition showed that the Agta are more similar to Central African Bayaka hunter-gath...

Ecological and genetic factors have influenced the composition of the human microbiome during our evolutionary history. We analyzed the oral microbiota of the Agta, a hunter-gatherer population where part of its members is adopting an agricultural diet. We show that age is the strongest factor modulating the microbiome, likely through immunosenesce...

A fundamental objective of modern zoos is promoting pro-environmental behaviors. This study experimentally assessed the contribution of zoo rangers (staff employed to engage visitors) in delivering a behavior change campaign promoting sustainable palm oil use. The campaign was delivered in a dedicated area in a walk-through animal exhibit, with ran...

Aims and hypothesis We hypothesised that there would be an association between maintaining a routine during lockdown and both lower emotional and behavioural difficulties in children and lower parental anxiety. We also hypothesised that children of ‘keyworker’ parents would have fewer emotional and behavioural symptoms due to having maintained more...

Examining development is essential for a full understanding of behaviour, including how individuals acquire traits and how adaptive evolutionary forces shape these processes. The present study explores cooperative development among the Agta, a Filipino hunter-gatherer population. A simple resource allocation game assessing both levels of cooperatio...

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a prospective population-based cohort which recruited pregnant women in 1990-1992 and has followed these women, their partners (Generation 0; G0) and their offspring (Generation 1; G1) ever since. The study reacted rapidly and repeatedly to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pande...

Neuroticism represents a personality disposition towards experiencing negative emotions more frequently and intensely. Longitudinal studies suggest that neuroticism increases risk of several psychological and physical problems. Improved understanding of how this trait manifests in early life could help inform preventative strategies in those liable...

Background Non-random selection into analytic subsamples could introduce selection bias in observational studies of SARS-CoV-2 infection and COVID-19 severity (e.g. including only those have had a COVID-19 PCR test). We explored the potential presence and impact of selection in such studies using data from self-report questionnaires and national re...

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a prospective population-based cohort study which recruited pregnant women in 1990-1992 and has followed these women, their partners (Generation 0; G0) and offspring (Generation 1; G1) ever since. The study reacted rapidly to the COVID-19 pandemic, deploying online questionnaires in Ma...

HLA-G is a promiscuous immune checkpoint molecule. The HLA-G gene presents substantial nucleotide variability in its regulatory regions. However, it encodes a limited number of proteins compared to classical HLA class I genes. We characterized the HLA-G genetic variability in 4640 individuals from 88 different population samples across the globe by...

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a prospective population-based cohort study which recruited pregnant women in 1990-1992 and has followed these women, their partners (Generation 0; G0) and their offspring (Generation 1; G1) ever since. The study has reacted rapidly and repeatedly to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID...

Worldwide mothers receive help with childcare from a diverse range of individuals (allomothers). Nonetheless, little exploration has occurred into why we see such diversity, such as different strategies used to buffer risk. Wide maternal childcare networks may be a consequence of situations of little material wealth and food storage - as is common...

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a prospective population-based cohort which recruited pregnant women in 1990-1992 and has followed these women, their partners (Generation 0; G0) and their offspring (Generation 1; G1) ever since. The study reacted rapidly and repeatedly to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pande...

Objectives: We aimed to examine agreement between common mental disorders (CMDs) from primary care records and repeated CMD questionnaire data from ALSPAC (the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children) over adolescence and young adulthood, explore factors affecting CMD identification in primary care records, and construct models predicting A...

Theoretical models relating to the evolution of human behaviour usually make assumptions about the kinship structure of social groups. Since humans were hunter-gatherers for most of our evolutionary history, data on the composition of contemporary hunter-gatherer groups has long been used to inform these models. Although several papers have taken a...

Background: Longitudinal studies are crucial for identifying potential risk factors for infection with, and consequences of, COVID-19, but relationships can be biased if they are associated with invitation and response to data collection. We describe factors relating to questionnaire invitation and response in COVID-19 questionnaire data collection...

A fundamental objective of modern zoos is promoting pro-environmental behaviors. This study experimentally assessed whether zoo rangers (staff employed to engage visitors) can promote sustainable palm oil use, with rangers either ‘present’ or ‘absent’ in the campaign space. Questionnaires assessing awareness, knowledge and purchasing intentions wer...

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a prospective population-based cohort study which recruited pregnant women in 1990-1992 and has followed these women, their partners (Generation 0; G0) and their offspring (Generation 1; G1) ever since. The study has reacted rapidly and repeatedly to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID...

Objectives: This paper has three objectives: 1) examine agreement between common mental disorders (CMDs) derived from primary health care records and repeated CMD questionnaire data from ALSPAC (the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children); 2) explore the factors affecting CMD identification in primary care records; and 3) taking ALSPAC as...

Background: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has exposed health inequalities within countries and globally. The fundamental determining factor behind an individual’s risk of infection is the number of social contacts they make. In many countries, physical distancing measures have been implemented to control transmission of severe acute respirato...

Importance COVID-19 public health mitigation measures are likely to have detrimental effects on emotional and behavioural problems in children. However, longitudinal studies with pre-pandemic data are scarce. Objective To explore trajectories of emotional and behavioural difficulties in children during the COVID-19 pandemic. Design and setting Data...

Non-maternal carers (allomothers) are hypothesized to lighten the mother's workload, allowing for the specialized human life history including relatively short interbirth intervals and multiple dependent offspring. Here, using in-depth observational data on childcare provided to 78 Agta children (a foraging population in the northern Philippines; a...

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a prospective population-based cohort study which recruited pregnant women in 1990-1992 from the Bristol area (UK). ALSPAC has followed these women, their partners (Generation 0; G0) and their offspring (Generation 1; G1) ever since. From 2012, ALSPAC has identified G1 participants who...

COVID-19 has exposed health inequalities within countries and globally. The fundamental determining factor behind an individuals risk of infection is the number of social contacts they make. In many countries, physical distancing measures have been implemented to control transmission of SARS-CoV-2, reducing social contacts to a minimum. Characteris...

Whilst previous observational studies have linked negative thought processes such as an external locus of control and holding negative cognitive styles with depression, the directionality of these associations and the potential role that these factors play in the transition to adulthood and parenthood has not yet been investigated. This study exami...

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a prospective population-based cohort study which recruited pregnant women in 1990-1992 and has followed these women, their partners (Generation 0; G0) and offspring (Generation 1; G1) ever since. The study reacted rapidly to the COVID-19 pandemic, deploying online questionnaires in Ma...

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a prospective population-based cohort study which recruited pregnant women in 1990-1992 from the Bristol area (UK). ALSPAC has followed these women, their partners (Generation 0; G0) and their offspring (Generation 1; G1) ever since. From 2012, ALSPAC has identified G1 participants who...

Background The COVID-19 pandemic and mitigation measures are likely to have a marked effect on mental health. It is important to use longitudinal data to improve inferences. Aims To quantify the prevalence of depression, anxiety and mental well-being before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. Also, to identify groups at risk of depression and/or anx...

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a prospective population-based cohort study which recruited pregnant women in 1990-1992. The resource provides an informative and efficient setting for collecting data on the current coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. In early March 2020, a questionnaire was developed in collaborati...

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a prospective population-based cohort study which recruited pregnant women in 1990-1992 and has followed these women, their partners and their offspring ever since. The study reacted rapidly to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, deploying an online questionnaire early on...

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a prospective population-based cohort study which recruited pregnant women in 1990-1992 and has followed these women, their partners and their offspring ever since. The study reacted rapidly to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, deploying an online questionnaire early on...

Background: Cohort studies tend to be designed to look forward from the time of enrolment of the participants, but there is considerable evidence that the previous generations have a particular relevance not only in the genes that they have passed on, their cultural beliefs and attitudes, but also in the ways in which previous environmental exposur...

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and related mitigation measures are associated with poorer mental health in cross-sectional and longitudinal surveys. However, it’s unclear if this represents an adaptive response to an unprecedented event that is short lived, or the beginning of longer mental health problems that persist beyond the...

Background: The impact of COVID-19 on mental health is unclear. Evidence from longitudinal studies with pre pandemic data are needed to address (1) how mental health has changed from pre-pandemic levels to during the COVID-19 pandemic and (2), whether there are groups at greater risk of poorer mental health during the pandemic? Methods: We used dat...

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) is a prospective population-based cohort study which recruited pregnant women in 1990-1992. The resource provides an informative and efficient setting for collecting data on the current coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. In early March 2020, a questionnaire was developed in collaborati...

Cultures around the world are converging as populations become more connected. On the one hand this increased connectedness can promote the recombination of existing cultural practices to generate new ones, but on the other it may lead to the replacement of traditional practices and global WEIRDing. Here we examine the process and causes of changes...

Although multilevel sociality is a universal feature of human social organization, its functional relevance remains unclear. Here, we investigated the effect of multilevel sociality on cumulative cultural evolution by using wireless sensing technology to map inter-and intraband social networks among Agta hunter-gatherers. By simulating the accumula...

Cultural group selection has been proposed as an explanation for humans’ highly cooperative nature. This theory argues that social learning mechanisms, combined with rewards and punishment, can stabilise any group behaviour, cooperative or not. Equilibrium selection can then operate, resulting in cooperative groups outcompeting less-cooperative gro...

Background: The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children-Generation 2 (ALSPAC-G2) was set up to provide a unique multi-generational cohort. It builds on the existing ALSPAC resource, which recruited 14,541 pregnancies to women resident in the South West of England who were expected to deliver between 01/04/1991 and 31/12/1992. Those women an...

We define two ‘problems of altruism’. The first is the classic problem of altruism, defined as the issue of how a behavior which decreases an individual’s lifetime reproductive success, while helping another individual (or individuals) increase their lifetime reproductive success, can evolve. We also define a ‘second-order problem of altruism’, whe...

Human children are frequently cared for by non-parental caregivers (alloparents), yet few studies have conducted systematic alternative hypothesis tests of why alloparents help. Here we explore whether predictions from kin selection, reciprocity, learning-to-mother and costly signalling hypotheses explain non-parental childcare among Agta hunter-ga...

Non-maternal caregivers (allomothers) are hypothesised to lighten the mother’s workload, producing human’s specialised life history where multiple dependent offspring are produced over a relatively short time period. Here, using in-depth observational data on who for cares for 78 Agta children (aged 0-6 years, a foraging population in northern Phil...

A long-standing hypothesis suggests that the transition from hunting and gathering to agriculture results in people working harder, spending more time engaged in subsistence activities and having less leisure time1,2. However, tests of this hypothesis are obscured by comparing between populations that vary in ecology and social organization, as wel...

We define two “problems of altruism.” The first is the classic problem of altruism, defined as the issue of how a behavior which decreases an individual’s lifetime reproductive success, while helping another individual (or individuals) increase their lifetime reproductive success, can evolve. We also define a “second-order problem of altruism,” whe...

Background: The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children-Generation 2 (ALSPAC-G2) was set up to provide a unique multi-generational cohort. It builds on the existing ALSPAC resource, which recruited 14,541 pregnancies to women resident in the South West of England who were expected to deliver between 01/04/1991 and 31/12/1992. Those women an...

The prisoner’s dilemma (PD) is a two-player game where there is a conflict between individual and group interests. Overall, both players do better if they both cooperate, yet each individual player does better if they defect. However, if both players defect then they do worse than if they both cooperate, hence the dilemma. This deceptively simple g...

Indigenous peoples’ participation in the co-management of protected areas is recognised as essential for conserving both cultural and biological diversity. While this practice is increasingly common, few studies have quantitatively evaluated the efficacy of these initiatives. Here we examine levels of knowledge and involvement among the Agta, a hun...

Despite much theorizing, the evolutionary reasons why humans cooperate extensively with unrelated individuals are still largely unknown. While reciprocity explains many instances of non-kin cooperation, much remains to be understood. A recent suite of models based upon ‘cooperative assortativity’ suggest that non-kin cooperation can evolve if indiv...

Storytelling is a human universal. From gathering around the camp-fire telling tales of ancestors to watching the latest television box-set, humans are inveterate producers and consumers of stories. Despite its ubiquity, little attention has been given to understanding the function and evolution of storytelling. Here we explore the impact of storyt...