# Asking questions about heritability

**URL:** <https://isgw-forum.colorado.edu/t/asking-questions-about-heritability/374>\
**Category:** Day 7\
**Created:** [June 24, 2022, 6:18am UTC](https://isgw-forum.colorado.edu/t/asking-questions-about-heritability/374 "2022-06-24T06:18:25Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![xueyingqin](https://isgw-forum.colorado.edu/user_avatar/isgw-forum.colorado.edu/xueyingqin/32/51_2.png) [@xueyingqin](https://isgw-forum.colorado.edu/u/xueyingqin)\
**Post date:** [June 24, 2022, 6:18am UTC](https://isgw-forum.colorado.edu/t/asking-questions-about-heritability/374/1 "2022-06-24T06:18:25Z")

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Hi,

I would like to ask one simiple question but seems confusing me a little bit about heritability. Why is heritability is H2 but not H? I have tried to search for answers from Internet, but there seems to be no quick answers about it.

Regards

Xueying

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**Author:** ![katrina](https://isgw-forum.colorado.edu/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/k/df705f/32.png) [@katrina](https://isgw-forum.colorado.edu/u/katrina)\
**Post date:** [June 26, 2022, 2:24am UTC](https://isgw-forum.colorado.edu/t/asking-questions-about-heritability/374/2 "2022-06-26T02:24:36Z")

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Hi Xueying

Good question. How things get named is often odd. After all, why is variance represented with s2? (I couldn’t figure out how to superscript the 2 on the forum).  
Heritability is a proportion of the variance. Since the variance is a squared metric, so too is heritability, hence h2.

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**Author:** ![xueyingqin](https://isgw-forum.colorado.edu/user_avatar/isgw-forum.colorado.edu/xueyingqin/32/51_2.png) [@xueyingqin](https://isgw-forum.colorado.edu/u/xueyingqin)\
**Post date:** [June 26, 2022, 10:53am UTC](https://isgw-forum.colorado.edu/t/asking-questions-about-heritability/374/3 "2022-06-26T10:53:32Z")

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Thank you very much, Katrina. I understand.

best  
Xueying