How evolutionary psychology proved some old folklore…and why both are wrong

There ’s an honest-to-goodness bit of folklore that child tend to more closely resemble their Father than their mothers . There ’s a potential evolutionary explanation for this , and one study seemed to support it all . Here ’s why it ’s all fake .

The canonical problem with evolutionary psychological science is that it can be used to explain practically anything if you ’re willing to think hard enough . countenance ’s look at the belief that tike see more like their fathers than their mothers . If we go back to former humans , you might guess that fathers would be more likely to help leaven children if they were certain that they really were the father . Thus , this raise resemblance would function as a form of ancient paternity trial run , and those babies that clear would be more likely to endure to generative long time than those who were rejected by their Father-God .

Not confident ? Well , the idea did get a measure of scientific credibility in 1995 , when researchers at the UC San Diego publish a field of study in which people were far more successful matching photos of babies with those of their fathers rather than those of their mothers .

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Here ’s where the theory go into problems . Every subsequent endeavour to replicate these initial findings has or else shown that baby resemble their fathers and mothers evenly , and if anything it might actually be the mother that they more nearly resemble . Psychologist Robert French , who himself has published studies in struggle with the original paper , explains why the UC San Diego study gained such initial acceptance :

It ’s a very aphrodisiac consequence , it ’s seductive , it ’s what evolutionary psychology would predict - and I think it ’s wrong . It ’s kind of strong to distinguish ‘ just - so ’ report from things that are really a mathematical product of evolution . ”

Here ’s what French stand for by “ just - so stories . ” There are possible evolutionary explanation for everything we ’ve discourse so far . We already acknowledge why babies might resemble their Father , but at the same time they might not resemble them because this would assist pressure fathers to accept their parental responsibility even in the absence of definitive evidence that the tyke was theirs . In this version , the important thing is that every baby has a founding father , even if it ’s not their biologic one , and the deficiency of an comfortable way for fathers to roll in the hay for indisputable helped stay fresh them in line .

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These idea both have their respective merit , and they ’re both utterly contradictory . And permit ’s not forget the initial bit of folklore itself . Researchers at Georgia Southern University offered an explanation for where that estimation might have issue forth from :

“ The prejudice in how mother note resemblance does not reflect actual resemblance and may be an evolved or check response to assure domestic father of their fatherhood . ”

you could see how fast we ’ve gotten lost here . If everything can be explained using evolutionary psychological science , then have we actually explain anything at all ? All this certainly is n’t think to completely dismiss the potential meritoriousness of evolutionary psychology ( although I ’d be lying if I saidwedidn’thaveourdoubts ) , but it ’s a useful reminder of why this is a landing field whose results should be treated with the greatest of caution and mental rejection .

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