Humans ‘attracted to partners that look like their parents’
Researchers have concluded opposites do not necessarily actually attract.
A team of experts from St Andrews University found women are attracted to men who remind them of their fathers and men to women who look like their mothers.
They found that people are far more likely to marry those who look like their opposite sex parent, particularly when it comes to hair and eye colour.
Anthony Little, 25, who led the research, said: "We found that people really did pick partners who resembled their opposite sex parent.
“It is something a lot of people have never looked at or thought about, that their partner shares the same hair and eye colour of their mother or father. But there was clear evidence of this.”
Dr Little, whose findings are published in this week’s Evolution and Human Behaviour journal, says it is well-known that if a person or animal is constantly exposed to an image, they become more attracted to and comforted by it.
“There are obviously a number of other factors such as personality, etc, that people look for in their partner but it seems looks are important, whether a person knows it or not.”
He added: “So the old saying that opposites attract really does seem to have been disproven. Rather, birds of a feather flock together, it seems.”
The researchers say many animals, mainly birds and monkeys, also tended to choose partners which resembled their parents.
An earlier study by the St Andrews team found people with older parents are usually attracted to older-looking partners and youngsters in mixed-race marriages tend to be attracted to a person of the same colour as their opposite sex parent.