Genome-wide analysis links 74 anxiety-associated loci, 39 of them novel
A GWAS of 693,869 individuals found 74 loci tied to anxiety symptom severity—the most in a single study, with 39 novel associations. By treating anxiety as a dimensional trait rather than a binary diagnosis, the study preserved more genetic signal and revealed a highly polygenic architecture with many small effects, including strong signals near brain-expressed genes PCLO and SORCS3. Some loci overlap genetically with heart disease, gut disorders, and migraines, suggesting shared biology. Common variants explain about 6% of anxiety-severity variation, and polygenic scores account for up to ~3% in individuals, far from predictive power, but the map provides concrete targets for biology-driven drug development and future functional studies.
