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Updated Ethnicity Results On Ancestry

Discussion in 'DNA Questions and Answers' started by FamilyHistoryGal, Jun 14, 2018.

  1. Does anyone have any idea how the updating is progressing? Mine are still showing they're based on 3000 results, not the increased number some others are reporting. I know the ethnicity isn't reliable (or that useful) but still... I'd like to see if there's a difference!
     
  2. peter

    peter Administrator Staff Member

    For the benefit of anyone else reading this thread, the new results don't appear automatically - you have to click 'Discover your DNA story' then you'll (hopefully) get a message 'Update available'.
     
    • Thanks! Thanks! x 1
  3. jorghes

    jorghes LostCousins Superstar

    I'm still waiting for the message on my grandmother's results, while I have them for all of the other DNA tests I've done.

    Since I only got the results for my grandmother this year and I've had the others for over a year and possibly longer, I presume that Ancestry is working their way through their massive database of results... or at least I hope that's whats happening!
     
  4. Thanks Peter... I'm still not getting that message though, mine says "your results are up to date" but they haven't changed. However I can't now see the pop-up that told me how many results it was based on.
    Mine reckon I'm 66% western European and only 14% GB, but 40 years of conventional research have failed to yield a single ancestor born outside England, so I'm not placing much faith in the results anyway!
     
  5. peter

    peter Administrator Staff Member

    Have you tried my spreadsheet survey?
     
  6. My results have finally been updated, as have my father's and my in-laws'. Mine have shifted much more towards the UK (so maybe I am looking in the right place for that brick wall...) but interestingly my in-laws' results are much, much more in line with both what conventional research and family legend tell us (yes, research and legend match - I admit I was surprised to find that there did appear to be actual evidence to back up the stories!)

    Ancestry say part of the change is down to a better, larger reference database, which makes sense, but they also mention advances in analysis. If the way they analyse and match DNA has changed, should we expect to see differences in the DNA matches? I haven't had time to trawl through those since the updated results arrived.
     
  7. jorghes

    jorghes LostCousins Superstar

    My paternal grandmother's results have updated - and just adjusted the spread between the three ethnic groups they previously listed. Removed some of the "trace" ethnicities, of course. So my grandmother's results have thus narrowed to three groups - England/Wales & Northwestern Europe, 64% (no Wales on this particular line, but that fits); an even 25% of European Jewish (amusing considering it is one of her grandparents who is Jewish) and 11% Ireland & Scotland (also completely fits).

    Found a new cousin on my Ancestry DNA results for my grandmother, and as a result I have been adding a number of new people to my tree... and in some ways confronting the reality of having European Jewish cousins... i.e. a large number of deaths in a short period of time and constantly repeating places of death, mainly Auschwitz and Sobibor.

    I think the update means that they are able to give you more specific and realistic results, due to the advances in the ways they compare the DNA, to how many samples they use to compare. Even if you're not a DNA expert, the idea that they've changed the comparison from 3,000 samples to 16,000 samples, should mean that your results are more accurate than they have been previously. For each of the DNA results I have, the ethnicity results only give 2-3 areas, all of which are correct to what I know about my family tree, as are the more specific regions given. The only strange results I have at the moment is Ancestry's insistence that both my brothers (but neither of my parents) seemingly have some Swedish ethnicity... doesn't make sense when Ancestry as already suggested we're all closely related!

    If to further help, this is the different between the 3,000 and 16,000 sample updates:
    My first ethnicity result gave me (3000 samples):
    Great Britain 66%
    Scandinavia 18% (? perhaps only from Norse invasions of England???)
    European Jewish 9%
    Ireland/Scotland/Wales 3%
    European East 2% (sure, from the Jewish?)
    European South 1% (??)
    and Finland/Northwest Russia 1% (?? again from the Jewish?)

    Most of which while it seemed reasonable, but a little strange. My results now give me (16000 samples):
    England, Wales & Northwestern Europe 79% (with particular emphasis on Wales and the West Midlands - completely correct)
    Ireland & Scotland 14% (with particular emphasis on Scotland: Central Scotland & Ulster Ireland - completely correct)
    and European Jewish 7% (again, completely correct.)
     
  8. peter

    peter Administrator Staff Member

    It makes sense to me - each of your parents could have a small amount of DNA which is Swedish, but which isn't identified as Swedish because there's not enough of it. But if your brothers inherited the Swedish bits from both parents this could be sufficient to tip the balance.

    But ethnicity estimates are meaningless unless you know the time-scale they relate to, and I'm not sure that Ancestry make that clear.
     

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