Twins Adopted To Different Parents Didn’t Know About Each Other Until Now

Audrey and Daisy in a Study

Audrey and Gracie’s families have been preparing for the girls to participate in a study conducted by child psychologist Nancy Segal, whose work focuses very specifically on Chinese twins separated by adoption. “We already have our paperwork started,” Jennifer Doering told the Journal Sentinel. “So we do a packet, that is just like a regular psychological packet, that goes through (Dr. Segal) and it goes through the school as well.”

Dr. Segal will send a researcher who will complete 24 hours or more of testing with Gracie and Audrey, focusing on each twin’s behaviors. Each twin’s family will also fill out a booklet each time the girls meet for the next 12 of their visits, tracking behaviors and emotions. The story of their reuniting is over, but their lives together are just beginning.

The Research of Separated Twins

Twins who were separated at birth and raised in different families can provide an amazing resource of research for scientists looking at the “nature versus nurture” argument as well as studying DNA. Twins Lily and Gillian were separated at birth and adopted from China, both to families in Ontario, Canada. Amazingly, the families discovered one another through an adoption group.

Cases like this help scientists gain valuable research. It would be difficult to overstate the importance of twins to genetic research. The Star writes, “They have been called nature’s living laboratories, scientific treasures, the workhorse of behavioral genetics. Twins are the vehicle through which scientists have been able to study and decode the effects of nature and nurture on our behavior, personality and disease vulnerability.”