Anxiety Isn’t Inherited. It’s Cultivated.

by Sapna Pradhan, February 1, 2026

Anxiety is genetic. Some people are just “wired this way.” We tend to talk about anxiety as if it’s an inheritance—an unavoidable permanency that’s quietly passed down through DNA. If your parents are anxious, you will be too. If you are “wired this way,” the best thing you can do is manage it. People will say that anxiety runs in families, and others will say people are just born anxious. This belief is strangely comforting because it clears everyone of responsibility—not parents, not schools, not society. If anxiety is genetic, then no one is really responsible for it, not parents, not schools, not society. It simply is.