Why do some people move far from where they grew up while others stay close? In a new preprint, we report a genome-wide study of migration distance in 250,000 people in the UK. We found 20 regions linked to how far people move from home, many in genes active during brain development; together, genetics explains about 5 percent of the variation in migration distance.
SPARK families served as the U.S. replication sample. A combined genetic score for migration also predicted mobility in more than 1,000 ancient individuals spanning 10,000 years.