Until then, we were told that we were looking for someone who looked like our father or mother. It would seem that this is not entirely false. Except that it would be our brother from whom we would be inspired during our quest for a soul mate, as a recent research suggests.
For the purposes of their study, published in the Evolution and Human Behavior Journal , the scientists asked the participants to classify the facial similarities between men, without knowing who were the brothers or the concubines of the women. They were indeed put in their hands a sheet on which was the photo of a man – the woman’s brother – then those of four other men among whom was the latter’s partner.
Like a family resemblance
However, the researchers found “clear evidence of a perceptual similarity in the facial features between a woman’s partner and her brother”. These results do not attest to “an absolute rule or truth for all women, but we find that, at levels higher than chance, the partners had a subtle resemblance to the brothers of the women,” says Dr. Tamsin Saxton, principal investigator of this study atThe Independent .
Previous research had also indicated that people chose partners who resembled their parents, the publication of this new study therefore makes it possible to confirm it, even widening this resemblance to the members of his siblings. According to this expert, “familiarity seems to be attractive” in the same way that people often choose a partner with similar views, tastes or interests as their own .
