New percentages rolling out for 10 million customers
At 11:59.59 a.m. PDT today, The Legal Genealogist was 49% British, 31% Scandinavian and 20% miscellaneous “low confidence regions.”
At noon, I was 66% England, Wales & Northwestern Europe, 19% Germanic Europe, 7% Norwegian, 6% Swedish and 2% Irish and Scottish.
At 11:59.59 a.m. PDT today, my sister was 37% British, 30% Europe West, 10% Scandinavian, 10% Iberian Peninsula, 8% Europe East and 5% miscellaneous “low confidence regions.”
At noon, she was 46% England, Wales & Northwestern Europe, 26% Germanic Europe, 10% Norwegian, 8% Irish and Scottish, 5% Eastern Europe and Russia, 4% Swedish and 1% Cameroon, Congo, and Southern Bantu Peoples.
Yep. AncestryDNA has updated its ethnicity estimates, and the results are rolling out for all 10 million plus persons who’ve tested with the company.
And the world has changed, yet again.
Ancestry Director of Scientific Communications Barry Starr explained that the update only affects the percentages that we see — how much Irish or German or Native American. It won’t affect our matches at all.
There were two changes in the update: more people — many from Ancestry’s own research studies — were added to the reference populations (the groups of people with well-documented pedigrees to whom our DNA is compared to make conclusions about ethnic origins) and the method of making the comparisons has changed.
In the last update, there were roughly 3000 reference samples assigned to 353 regions of the world. In this update, there are 16,000 reference samples assigned to 380 possible regions. This helps screen out less-likely regions and make more nuanced estimates between, say, Scandinavian and Norwegian or Swedish. There are better samples and regions particularly from Europe and Asia and, although Starr said more work needed to be and is being done there, better in Africa as well.
On the methodology side, in the last version, the bits and pieces of DNA were compared bit by bit, while the new update looks at longer stretches of DNA at a time. That also helps minimize the chances of misreading a person’s ethnic origins.
As a result, Starr said, just about everyone who’s ever tested with Ancestry will see some changes: the percentages will change and low confidence regions will generally be eliminated. And everybody will see exactly how the numbers were changed with a reference as to how thje results were refined.
As an example, here’s my change in the percentages:
Ancestry Senior Director of Product Marketing Stephen Baloglu said all AncestryDNA customers will see the new ethnicity estimates today if they happen to log on today, and all customers will get an email notice that the estimates have been updated. In fact, since the emails will be rolled out over several days, you may very well see the update before you get the email.
As you check your new estimates, there will be what Ancestry is calling a transition experience. You’ll be asked a few questions (what do you expect your ethnicity to be, what changes do you expect and how close to what you expected your current estimate is).
You’ll be given the opportunity to review the previous estimates and the new estimates and, for a time, to keep the older estimate and wait to put the update into effect. You’ll be able to toggle back and forth even on the map of regions to see what’s changed. Here for example is mine:
And you’ll be asked how satisfied you are with the new estimates, and how closely you think they align with what you know about your ethnic origins.
There is help available to understand the changes including a white paper and, eventually, a scientific paper will be published explaining the methodology of the change.
If memory serves me correctly, this is now the third ethnicity estimate AncestryDNA customers have had. Because DNA analysis in general and ethnicity estimates in particular are still new and can change based on more and better data, it’s not likely to be the last.
And remember what these numbers are: the only way to get these percentages is by comparing the test results of folks like you and me — alive today — to the test results of other people who are alive today (and not to the actual DNA of our ancient ancestors!!). Because of that, it’s all a numbers game based on one fundamental assumption: that people who live in an area today (say, modern Englishmen and -women) and who have all four of their grandparents born in that area are typical of the genetic signature of that population generations ago.
The numbers are terrific at the continental level: Europe versus Africa versus Asia. But they may still be more than a little problematic at the regional or country level.
So… how did your estimate change? Better? Worse?
Definitely more realistic. The inaccurate Scandinavian is gone!
I second Elizabeth’s comment. My “Irish” went from 39% to a much more realistic 13%, which would be expected as I have only one Irish great grandmother. I was starting to question my own research! I look forward to 23&Me updating their estimates, too.
Maybe good for some, but not for me. My family has been Swiss for 500 years; I accepted the under 1% Scandinavian percentile in the original as “fudge factor”, but now I am 10% Swedish! Wow. Trading in my Alpenhorn for a Volvo…. NOT!
Cool, another TLG reader with roots in the Prättigau! I can’t recall if I have ancestors from Schiers, but I do have them from St. Antönien, Luzein, Küblis, Fideris, Fanas, Conters, Klosters, and Serneus. I have done a ton of research in the church books of Graubünden and am passionate about that aspect of my heritage. I also have Swiss ancestors from Glarus and Bern.
Like you experienced, my dad’s Germanic % is way too low. He has 54% England/Wales/NW Europe, 22% Ireland/Scotland, 9% Germanic, 8% France, 4% Sweden, 3% Finland. But his father was 75% Swiss and 25% German. His mother was more of a mix, including England, Scotland, Netherlands, France. There is a bit of Norway further back (via Netherlands), but the Sweden and Finland are bizarre. I suspect lumping in NW Europe with England is also skewing results.
A bunch of crap. In stead of refining the regions and percentages all they did is lump more of them together to make it look more accurate for those who do not have trees or those just researching just a couple of lines
At first I was confused. 25% of my ancestry is Acadian. Most of my matches have Acadian surnames. 25% of my ancestry is Irish (mother was second gen). I lost 30% Western Europe and have only 7% France. What?? Then I noticed that they grouped NW France in with England. Most of the Acadians were from NW France and I get why they grouped it with SW England (1066 and All That). So it’s making a lot more sense. My concern is that while the groups are based on DNA connections, the locations are based on “Well documented trees”. My tree is very well documented. It just happens to be wrong. My father’s father is not the man we thought was our grandfather and so that whole line is incorrect. I’ve set that GF as “step”, but nothing has changed.
I have had at least 3 changes from FTDNA, and frankly, I pretty much ignore the ethnicity estimates. There simply isn’t a large enough sample, and the parameters are pretty flakey. I read a post the other day from someone who is disappointed that she can’t use the ethnicity estimates to find relatives, and felt that the tests were a waste of money. (Ah, the power of advertising.) I hope that the responses she received helped her understand how very useful DNA can be if one uses the matching tools. Very recently I was contacted by a second cousin I had never heard of (the scattering of families sometimes does that). It turns out that his family has original letters and other material from a line I have been trying to learn more about besides their names. They have not only been fun to get to know, but they have been so generous in sharing the information about our mutual ancestors with me. Now, THAT is the real value of DNA testing. Though many people don’t respond to an inquiry, there will be one like this. Real treasure.
Overall the new estimates are consistent with the old ones that placed about 50-60% of my ancestry somewhere in the British Isles, and 30-40% of it in the north western part of continental Europe, with a few Vikings thrown in for good measure. The main difference between the two is the complete elimination of the Iberian element (4%). The less than 1% trace elements in eastern and southern Europe and North Africa have also been eliminated, but these were highly suspect to begin with.
They have reshuffled the British Isles, lumping Wales with England instead of with Ireland and Scotland. Then they have lumped both England and Wales together with Northwestern Europe. In the process, it looks as if some of the previously generic “British” elements may possibly have been reassigned to Scotland and Ireland. Meanwhile, the Scandinavian and Finnish-Russian elements seem to have been absorbed into the Norwegian category (not a surprise in view of the ridiculously high percentage of my MtDNA matches whose family trees show a solid 300-400 years worth of exclusively Norwegian ancestry).
My Iberian Peninsula also disappeared, but Ireland & Scotland increased, which is closer to what I believe is true. Looking forward to when they can break out France and Germany from the general “Northwest Europe” category. LivingDNA is actively working on this.
We’ve been waiting for LivingDNA for a while now. I’ll believe it when I see it.
I had 4 family members tested that had 87-99% Jewish, and now we’re all 100% Jewish. But I already knew that!
The old estimate seemed closer to what I know about my ethnicity than the new one. The new has boosted my DNA Ireland/Scotland to 80%. The old estimate was 60% Irish which seems correct as my Dad was as close to 100% as one could get. Scotland was previously represented in the England/Wales estimate which was about 26%.West Europe was 1% and Scandinavian 6%. All of that was combined -except Scandinavian- and comes in at 20%. The Scandinavian was eliminated. The new estimate seems rather tilted toward my paternal DNA. My maternal lines are primarily English and German. Go figure. The ethnicity estimate is fun but I use DNA as a tool to help me find my dearly departed ones.
My father’s results are definitely more accurate, but the Germanic is still too low. It did drop off areas that shouldn’t have been there.
Unfortunately, my results are more mixed. It correctly increased Germanic. However, although my father does show 4% France, which is about the correct amount from his Acadian ancestry, it doesn’t show me with any France component, and I have lots of matches from that Acadian ancestry. Also, it dropped all my East European ancestry, even though it should show about 6% Lithuanian. Again, I have a number of matches from that ancestry.
OMG I am no longer Scandinavian! Never could figure that part out anyways 🙂
Combining populations can be tricked: some
geneticists say the border between England and Wales is a genetic wall.
My father is Italian, and my mother is Lebanese. I cam back 50% Middle Eastern, and 46% Italian. But, here’s the problem…
My father (who is 100% Northern Italian) has 43% French DNA, and 32% Italian DNA. But I have 46% Italian DNA and 0% French. And my daughter has 26% French DNA and 0% Italian DNA. (Note: my wife is 100% English/Scottish.)
I was wondering if you have any explanation for this. Could it be that my mother’s middle eastern DNA made my northern Italian French/Italian DNA look more like Italian DNA?
Thanks for the great articles!
I think you’d need to read the white paper for a better understanding, but the likelihood here is that there’s a very fine line between the northern Italian and French and Ancestry is reading it one way with your father and daughter and another way with you.
As you have written before: Still not soup!