Note: Fun stuff at the bottom.
Do you remember the TV commercials many years back in which dog owners and their furry friends looked eerily alike? I don’t recall the product, a typical dismay of advertisers, but sure remember the buddy-pairs. Did the owners unconsciously pick pets that resembled themselves? Or did it happen by some type of merging of the two characters: owner and pet.
What about the popular myth (or not) that women who live together start to menstruate at the same time? (Sorry, it doesn’t include the Golden Girls). And what about married couples starting to resemble each other? Does any of this really happen?
Last Valentine’s day when my husband, Michael and I exchanged cards, I opened mine first. I laughed out-loud; a reaction I am certain he didn’t expect. When he opened his own, he got the joke. (Notice the title picture.) The cards were almost identical except for the wife and husband titles. It got me thinking about whether we really synchronize lives with those around us or not.
Pet Resemblance
Carmen was a neighbor in my previous Scottsdale community. She was an active, pretty women with long-flowing black hair. I always gawked when she walked her tall, beautiful black-haired afghan dog, both with their long tresses flowing to match their quick pace. Dogs who look like their owners is not an uncommon sight. If you’ve never seen it, take a peek at this quick video.
Not surprisingly for a country of pet-lovers, research into this phenomenon has been frequent. The question boils down to the same options – does this close resemblance grow over time, called “convergence” or do the owners (subconsciously or not), pick the pets that most resemble them.
The bottom line is that the stereotype of physical compatibly with people and pets does stem from choice. This preference need not be an egotistical matter, perhaps it is simply that we are more comfortable with shared looks. This may not bode well for race relations, but best to be alerted to our subconscious reactions. I admit when I think about it, my favorite dog (which I don’t yet own) tends to have similar looks and traits to my own. How about you?
Women and the McClintock Effect
Researchers may have refuted the idea that dogs and owners “grow” to look alike, but what about the centuries-old concept that women living together menstruate together (at the same time)? This “menstrual synchrony” is based on the theory that women in close physical contact can influence each other through pheromones.
In the 1970s, Wellesley College grad Martha McClintock conducted a study with 135 college women at the dorms of her alma mater. The objective was to track whether their cycles aligned. Not accounting for other cycle factors, McClintock (later the founder and director of the Institute for Mind and Biology), concluded that indeed there was a “syncing up” of the cycles. It came to be known as the “McClintock Effect.” Without a doubt you know a woman who could speak to this and confirm it in her own experience.
The anecdotally-recognized theory is not so easily dispelled as the dog-owner look-alike myth. Yet, more current research does bring much of it into question. A 2006 study in China (186 women) and a very large study (1500 subjects) conducted by Oxford University both question the validity of the McClintock Effect as being within the realms of mathematical coincidence. The Oxford study even suggests it is more common for the cycles of women in close environments to diverge over time rather than sync. Still, not all current research disregards the long-held belief. A much smaller 2017 study concluded that 44% of their participants experienced period synchrony-related migraines.
Mathematical probability complicates this particular research, with the outcomes being neither proved nor disproved (I accept that scientists don’t favor those terms). Even the pheromone-connection is not strictly clear. Additionally, because periods are nowhere near “standard” (especially in length of days), cycles can be confusing.
…..
Regarding the age-old belief that many women maintain, I read one line I thought everyone could agree with:
“…[It’s] natural to connect our physical experiences
with our emotional ones,
and having a period that “syncs” with a family member or close friend
adds another layer to our relationships.”—- Kathryn Watson (Healthline)
But the counsel regarding being ‘out of sync’ follows — women shouldn’t worry about a disconnect either.
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Similarities in Long-time Couples
Is there any more evidence that longtime couples start to resemble each other – at least any more evidence than that connecting dogs/owners or menstruating women? Oddly, yes.
Randomly-paired photos of people have been used to determine that a couple living together 20 years or more often demonstrate similar facial features. Any two people considered a “couple” appear to converge and grow to resemble each other in their outward veneer. The trial also indicated that 1) this is not perceived in younger couples and 2) was not simply reflecting an “increased homogeneity of all older people.” Hence long-time partners grow steadily more similar.
Like me, you may wonder, how is that possible? Hint: it has greater significance than how one half of the couple dresses the other.
One of the promising theories is known as “emotional efference.’ It proposes that emotions create vascular changes, which act as veins and arteries, diverting blood to and from the brain and regulated by facial muscles. Habitual use of muscles can affect physical features. Somewhat similar to how someone who frequently narrows their eyes (while attempting to process an idea), can develop creases between the eyes.
Another idea has to do with diet. Keeping the same diet for years can have an effect on the fatty tissues of the skin and face. Or perhaps it is both theories working in synergy.
Okay, we can buy some of the diet idea, but why do vascular changes create look-alike couples? The belief is that two people co-exiting for many years change via “repeated empathic mimicry.” This increased convergence of looks, sharing fascial resemblances, was even further associated with happy marriages. [Yikes, what about those of us who thought we chose someone on the “opposites attract” basis?]
FINAL THOUGHT
There’s no study on it, but I proclaim that if we want to Age with Pizzazz, it’s best that we pick people, pets, even things around us that synchronize with our lives – no matter how we define that harmonizing. Becoming more similar? Looking alike? Shared Thoughts? Congruent aesthetics? Adopting common goals and missions? Whether inside or outside a relationship, is there a purpose to such synchronicity? An empowerment of the higher-self? For that I have no answer, no study to support it. But I suspect that at a minimum, it’s a happier way to live.
P.S. Happy Anniversary to my husband, Michael
P.P.S. I highly recommend this short upbeat video which summarizes findings above about couples:
Or just enjoy another artistic expression of synchronicity. (For you Sting fans, sorry, Synchronicity I only).
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Reference:
Zajonc, R.B., Adelmann, P.K. , Murphy, S.T., Niedenthal, P.M. (1987). Convergence in the physical appearance of spouses. University of Michigan. Motivation and emotion, 11, 335-346. From Annenberg Usc.edu. Convergence in the physical appearance of spouses (usc.edu)
