Most kids grow like dandelions. They bloom everywhere, growing up sturdy and strong in the most desolate neighborhoods or the ritziest.

Others seem to come into the world fragile. They’re sensitive kids who are prone trouble, but also brilliance. The kind who grow up to poets or addicts or both.

In the new issue of Atlantic Monthly, David Dobbs outlines the “orchid hypothesis,” an emerging genetic theory that offers some insight into how, and why, our genetic differences shape how we grow and who we become.Geneticists have understood for some time that particular gene variants predispose some kids to traits like ADHD, depression and bipolar disorder. Having the high-risk variant of a gene doesn’t doom a kid to ADHD or depression, it just makes it more likely. It seems that parenting, and the environment a child is parented in, makes the difference.

The standard model for this can be called the “vulnerability hypothesis”, and it focuses on identifying which genes make children more vulnerable to mental health and behavioral problems.

The emerging “orchid hypothesis” turns that model around by showing that the same genetic variants that make kids more vulnerable also poise them for spectacular achievement under the right conditions. Kids with high-risk “orchid” genes are proving to be more resilient, focused and creative than their hardy “dandelion” peers, if they are treated like orchids – raised under exactly the right conditions.

What this genetic insight offers, as Dobbs puts it, is an explanation of why genetic variations for pesky stuff like depression have not only survived 50,000 years of natural selection, but have become increasingly widespread.

If these genes were only a liability, they should have been “bred out” long ago. The orchid hypothesis suggests that these traits are vital to our growth as a species because under the right conditions, they burst out into creative, innovative genius.

For parents, this suggests that we can make a profound difference in the lives of our sensitive children by carefully shaping their environments to help them succeed.

So for those of you, like me, who read the opening paragraphs of that Atlantic article and thought, “Predisposition to emotional turbulence, aggression and distraction? That’s my kid!”: no pressure. You’re kids will be not just fine, but great. As long as you raise them perfectly. If they happen to develop any of those risky traits, you can just lie awake at night knowing it’s all your fault.

Just kidding. I wasn’t lying awake last night thinking that. NO.

In all seriousness you shouldn’t be either, though I’m sure some talk show pundit will try to frame it that way. The real takeaway here is that genetics is interesting, and – no real shock – good parenting helps kids grow up to have happier lives than crappy abusive parenting. I didn’t need a genetic test to tell me that.

Photo: Zack Grossbart

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