Why Some Children Look More Like Their Father And Others Like Their Mother

All young parents and family relatives are greatly concerned in the early days after birth about who the baby looks like. Some see it more like the father, others more like the mother. But newborns change quickly, so the final resemblance to one parent or another only shows up in more or less adulthood. Throughout this process of forming a new person, older members of the family never tire of wondering why the baby absorbed so many traits of one parent and not the other.

Such different genes

Everything-the outward traits, the character, even how a person will make the most important decisions in life-very much depends on the genes they inherited. Fifty percent of this genetic material comes from the mother and the other 50 percent from the father. But each of the parents in turn inherits 50% of the genes from their parents, who inherit 50% from their parents, and so on. As a result of this constant mixing (as geneticists say, “crossing over”), each human cell contains a whole genetic cocktail.

Genes are divided into dominant and recessive genes according to their share in the structure of the new organism. The dominant genes in the human population in general include genes for normal vision and hearing, right-handedness, average height, normal glucose absorption, dark hair, and thousands of other features. Most humans conform to these traits, sorted out by evolution over millions of years.

The genes for blindness and deafness, left-handedness, abnormally tall or short stature, tendency to diabetes, blond hair, etc. are considered recessive. People with these traits are in the minority in the population. All of these genes – recessive and dominant – determine the traits of each new generation.

The combination of genes and the appearance of children

But each branch (lineage) of people also has its own dominant and recessive genes. In the father’s lineage, for example, there may be dominant genes for red hair and leering. If the mother has the same recessive gene in her DNA, but it did not show up in her appearance (for example, the woman is blonde with clear skin), then most of the couple’s children will probably be red-haired and brown-haired.

Blondes with clear skin will be in the absolute minority. There is also a high probability of red-haired babies without cones. The father will be very proud that the offspring all, as one, went to him. In fact, just met the respective genes of the parents.

But even if the mother does not have the “red-haired and boned” gene, at least one of her four children will be an exact copy of the red-haired father. Another law of genetics applies here: the dominant gene of each of the parents manifests itself in a 1:2:1 ratio (in any sequence). It is expressed approximately in the following way: one descendant will be blond, the other redheaded and bobbed, and two more will have mixed traits of both parents.

Moreover, all attempts are counted: even if the mother decided not to have a child and had an abortion, the crossing has already taken place and the “cocktail” of genes has been formed. The next pregnancy, which ended in childbirth or miscarriage, is the second version of crossbreeding. And so it will continue as long as the couple will conceive children.

We should also not forget that there are many dominant and recessive genes in each DNA, so there can be many possible combinations. Only the “strongest” ones will show up and be noticeable in the child’s appearance and character.