Variation in Human Mate Choice: Simultaneously Investigating Heritability, Parental Influence,...
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Transcript of Variation in Human Mate Choice: Simultaneously Investigating Heritability, Parental Influence,...
Variation in Human Mate Choice: Simultaneously
Investigating Heritability, Parental Influence, Sexual
Imprinting, and Assortative Mating
By: Phillip Skaliy
Terms
Assortative Mating – the frequency at which individuals mate with persons of similar phenotype (positive assortative mating) or different phenotype (negative assortative mating)
Sexual Imprinting - individuals acquire mate-choice criteria during development by using their opposite-sex parent as the template of a desirable mate
MZ – monozygotic (identical twins)
DZ – dizygotic (non-identical twins)
Overview
Human mate choice is essential to evolution
Basis of variation in mate choice is not well understood
Look at twins, partners, parents
Test for genetic and family environmental influences on mate choice
Different traits analyzed
Test for sexual imprinting
Background
Studies before thisRomantic partners correlate positively on age, social
attitudes, and religiosityBelieved that similarity between partners is due to
initial choice (assortative mating)
Conflicting results – why do we choose a particular mate over anotherConstraints of mating marketCould be genetic or non-genetic
Background
Possible non-genetic/environmental factor is the influence of Parents on mate decisionEnsure daughters marry successful men
Sexual ImprintingOpposite sex parent as template for mate
Traits looked at:Education, yearly income, Religiosity, Social
attitudes, Personality, Height and age, Body mass index (BMI), Length of relationship
Experiment
Non-genetic it should be revealed in a twin study as a family
environmental effect on females for mate choice regarding investment-related traits.
Genetic influences See if there is any similarity or correlations between the
twin’s spouses and see if there is a difference between the spouses of MZ and DZ twins
Sexual Imprinting Twin’s partner should be more similar to the twin’s
opposite-sex parent than to a co-twin or a same-sex parent
Table One
22,861 individuals from 6,105 independent families
Table 2
In this table it is clear that twins’ partners were not more similar in any trait to the twins’ opposite-sex parent than to the twins’ same-sex parent. That’s a strike against the imprinting thesis.
Table 3 Table 3 shows that partners correlated very weakly on some traits (e.g.,
income and personality) but strongly on others (e.g., religiosity and attitudes).
Table 4 - shows the correlations between twin pair partners on each trait
Notice that there’s not a difference between MZ and DZ females for income.
From the tables
Twin’s Partners correlated weakly on most traits but positive on some
Correlation between twin pair partners was not significant for BMI, height, and all personality scales, but there were small but significant correlations between twin pair partners for education, income, religiosity, attitudes, and age.Tested to see if there was a difference between MZ
and DZ partners, but there was none (correlation not higher in MZ)
indicates no significant genetic influence on mate choice
From the tables
Specifically for income and age, correlations between female MZ and DZ twin pair partners were highly significant and similar in size, indicating a genuine family environmental influence on women’s mate choice for these traits even after controlling for assortative mating
There was no evidence for the sexual imprinting hypothesis. A twin's spouse was much more similar to the twin and
co-twin than the twin's opposite-sex parent.
For the heritability of each trait, twin pair correlations were significantly greater for MZ pairs than for DZ pairs
Discussion
Overall, found that genetic variation accounts for very little individual variation in human mate choice.Twin’s partners correlated very littleFurthermore, there were no significant genetic
effects on mate choice in either males or females for any individual trait.
it is remarkable that a choice behavior so central to individuals’ lives exhibits a near-zero genetic component But choice of mate requires reciprocity
DiscussionOne positive finding in the results is an influence
of family environment on female mate choice in terms of the income and age of a partnerparental influence is expected to primarily involve
pressure on a daughter to mate with successful manThere was little evidence for substantial familial
effects on other aspects of mate choice.
Main conclusion: Despite being one of the most important choices in human life, variation in partner choice followed no apparent order aside from a small family environmental influence on the age and income of females’ mate choices and the similarity of partners in some traits.
Improve Study
Study different traits – pheromones, facial characteristics
Look at newlyweds and see if there is a difference
Done in Australia – different environmental influences
References
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/39494/assortative-mating
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2011/04/love-is-not-a-hardwired-battlefield/
http://www.jstor.org.pallas2.tcl.sc.edu/stable/10.1086/659629?&Search=yes&searchText=choice&searchText=variation&searchText=mate&searchText=human&list=hide&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicResults%3Fla%3D%26wc%3Don%26acc%3Don%26gw%3Djtx%26Query%3Dvariation%2Bin%2Bhuman%2Bmate%2Bchoice%26sbq%3Dvariation%2Bin%2Bhuman%2Bmate%2Bchoice%26prq%3Dhuman%2Bvaritation%2Bin%2Bmate%2Bchoice%26si%3D1%26jtxsi%3D1%26jcpsi%3D1%26artsi%3D1%26so%3Dnew%26Go.x%3D0%26Go.y%3D0%26Go%3DGo%26hp%3D25&prevSearch=&item=6&ttl=5299&returnArticleService=showFullText&