It’s easy to look at your parents or grandparents and think your life is nothing like theirs. The advent of technology and social media, shifting ideas about adulthood, emerging political viewpoints and different opinions on parenting are just a few of the ways young people might think they’re dissimilar to their parents.
For anyone thinking they can avoid turning into their mom or dad, however, scientific research suggests you might have another thing coming. In truth, biological and social interactions predispose children to all the nuances of their parents’ behaviors. The way parents act, sound and think can imprint on children at various stages in their lives.
But just how far do these similarities extend? If your dad has embarrassingly archaic dance moves, is there ever any hope you’ll impress strangers at the club? To find out, we surveyed over 1,000 people about which parent they most resembled, when they first realized the similarities and how their parents’ behaviors have impacted their financial habits. Want to know how much you’re likely to turn into your mom or dad? Read on for a look into the future.
Perhaps the most fundamental way we start to mirror our parents is in the way we look. For an explanation, look no further than basic biology. Behaviors and personality may benefit from a conversation about nature versus nature, but many predominant physical traits are linked to the genes we inherit from our biological parents. Everything from fingerprint patterns, crooked teeth, hair color and toenail shape can be passed on from parents to children.
When asked which members of their family they most resembled, 47 percent of men said they looked more like their father, followed by 30 percent who felt they looked more like their mother. For 77 percent of men, the link became most clear when they started losing their hair. The source of baldness can be complicated to identify, but research suggests both parents contribute to the genes that promote hair loss and baldness over time.
Forty-one percent of women said they looked more like their mother, and 31 percent suggested it was their father whose physical traits they saw most in themselves. Women were also more likely to see the resemblance in themselves without having to be told it was there. Sixty-five percent of women saw some connection to their parents just from looking in the mirror, and just as many realized the similarities when they developed the same body shape as either of their parents.
Similar Situations
Whether by nature or by nurture, our parents tend to have a big impact on our personalities. But which parent do we tend to take our cues from?
Women were split on which parent they took after more. Exactly 35 percent voted for their mother as the parent they acted like the most, while another 35 percent said it was their father. Nineteen percent identified both parents as having an impact on their personality.
For men, the connection was more one-sided. Forty percent of men said they acted more like their father, compared to 28 percent who saw themselves more in their mother. Like women, another 21 percent of men gave credit to both parents for influencing their behavior.
Smart Spending?
So your parents play a role in deciding what you look like and how you act, but what about how you manage your finances?
People whose parents were financially responsible were more likely to say they were financially responsible compared to people whose parents had bad money management skills. Compared to 48 percent of kids with fiscally irresponsible parents, 62 percent of kids with money-smart role models self-identified as also being financially responsible.
Countdown to Commonalities
Given how much of an influence parents play in their children’s lives, you might wonder how long you have before you start to see either your mother or father (or both) looking back at you in the mirror.
As it happens, it may already be too late. According to people surveyed, children who started looking and acting like their parents were in their teens and early 20s. Men said they started acting like their dads around 21, and women did the same at 20. Acting like mom may come more naturally for men because they picked up their traits around 19, while women did the same at 23. Physical traits came even earlier. Whether you’re likely to take after your mother or father, you’ll probably see the connection before or around 18 years old.
Look Alike, Date Alike
We look like our parents, tend to act like our parents and even spend money like our parents, so is it really a stretch to suggest we might end up feeling attracted to people who look or act like our parents? The “ick” factor notwithstanding, there’s some evidence that people are at least marginally attracted to people who look like their mother or father.
In our study, 54 percent of female baby boomers, 51 percent of millennial women, and 43 percent of Gen Xers confessed to dating men who looked or acted like their own father. For men, this was much less common among older generations. While 53 percent of male millennials dated someone who resembled their mother, only 37 percent of Gen X men and 24 percent of male baby boomers said the same.
Dating isn’t always a complete commitment, though, and while 57 percent of men and 65 percent of women were in relationships with people who looked like their parents, only 42 to 45 percent of respondents married people who looked like their parents.
From the time we’re small, the smallest actions from our parents can leave a tremendous impact on our lives. Not only do parents pass on hereditary factors like hair and eye color but also the way they raise their children can impress their personalities and behaviors. Even something that might seem as private as the way parents manage their finances can either positively or negatively affect the way their children do the same.
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Methodology and Limitations
To gather the data presented in the study above, 1,006 responses were taken from a survey on Amazon’s Mechanical Turk service. Of these respondents, 405 identified as men, 597 identified as women and four identified outside those genders. Eighty-eight of these respondents were baby boomers, 299 were Gen Xers, 599 were millennials and 20 were from a generation listed outside those.
All data represented in the above study rely on self-reporting, which can have issues such as exaggeration or telescoping, so to verify that the answers we received were as accurate as possible, attention checks were used. To qualify for the survey, a respondent had to grow up with one mom and one dad (rather than a combination of parent and step-parent, grandparents or other relatives) for sample size purposes.
Sources
- https://www.parents.com/getting-pregnant/genetics/genetics-and-your-baby/
- https://www.businessinsider.com/baldness-genes-going-bald-isnt-all-your-mothers-fault-2018-3
- https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2017/08/young-adult-video.html
- https://mic.com/articles/30867/4-ways-our-20s-are-different-than-our-parents-20s#.lyatKeZYM
- https://mic.com/articles/30867/4-ways-our-20s-are-different-than-our-parents-20s#.lyatKeZYM
- https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/03/16/how-millennials-compare-with-their-grandparents/
- https://www.businessinsider.com/differences-millennial-gen-x-baby-boomer-parents-2017-11
- https://content.dollarshaveclub.com/en-us/story/can-avoid-becoming-parents-or-inevitable
- https://www.livestrong.com/article/562015-do-children-inherit-their-parents-personalities/
- https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/attraction-evolved/201801/our-attraction-partners-who-look-our-parents
- https://www.bustle.com/p/these-12-bad-habits-are-really-easy-to-inherit-from-your-parents-8230645
Fair Use Statement
Which parent do you take after? You don’t have to keep it among your family when sharing the results of this study and any related images for noncommercial use. Just give our contributors credit by including a link back to this page in your article.
