ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, December 14, 1995 TAG: 9512140073
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-3 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: NEW YORK
SOURCE: Associated Press
INFANTS TEND TO look more like fathers than mothers, a new study shows.
A psychologist who kept hearing how much his little girl resembled him did some research and found babies are more likely to look like Daddy than Mommy.
Nicholas Christenfeld asked people to match photos of children with the youngsters' parents, and found that 1-year-olds were linked to the right fathers more often than chance would predict.
The effect didn't hold up with older children. When shown pictures of the same children at ages 10 and 20, people couldn't match the children with either parent.
Christenfeld, a social psychologist at the University of California at San Diego, said there may be a subtle evolutionary advantage for a child to look like its father: Fathers might subconsciously pick up on the resemblance and be more likely to take care of their child.
``It's just interesting. I'm not sure what one would do with it to make the world a better place,'' he said. ``It's possible fathers will now look at their kids, say, `The kid doesn't look like me,' and then look at the milkman.''
The 122 people in Christenfeld's study were shown pictures of three fathers for each 1-year-old. They picked the right father 50 percent of the time, more than the 33 percent expected by chance.
LENGTH: Short : 36 linesby CNB