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Why Couples Look Alike After Many Years Of Marriage! - Family - Nairaland

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Why Do Couples Tend To Look Alike? / Yes! It Is True That Husband And Wife Look Alike After Many Years Together / Why Couples Fight (2) (3) (4)

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Why Couples Look Alike After Many Years Of Marriage! by godman01(m): 2:22pm On Aug 10, 2014
Have you noticed or are you wondering why
couples who initially had no particular facial
resemblance to each other when they first
married now resemble each other after many
years of marriage?
It seems weird for people to look for those who
resemble them when they want to choose
partners. However, over time, what seems weird
becomes an easy-to-get. It’s strange though, a
study has proved, with evidence, that it happens.
So, if you stay with your spouse for a couple of
decades, you will end up looking more like him or
her. But why is it so?
The study published in the journal of Motivation
and Emotion found that physical likeness between
couples increases over time, and through the
years, couples’ wrinkles form in the same places
because of a lifetime of shared emotions.
Sometimes, it is even tempting to think the
semblance has been there before they married,
but the study has shown that the emotions
people experience everyday could change their
facial features over time. The increase in facial
similarity results from decades of shared
emotions, hence, couples who have been married
for about 25 years start to look alike gradually.
In the study carried out by Robert Zajonc, a
psychologist at the University of Michigan, with
his graduate students Pamela Adelmann, Sheila
Murphy and Paula Niedenthal, 110 participants
were presented a random array of photographs of
faces, with the backgrounds blacked out so that
only the faces could be seen, with an instruction
to match the men with the women who resembled
most.
Two dozens of the photographs were of couples
when they first got married; another two dozens
were of the same couples 25 years after
marriage, most taken around the time of their
silver wedding anniversary. All the couples in the
photographs were white, lived in Michigan or
Wisconsin and were between 50 and 60 years old
at the time of the second picture.
The results showed that the couples had grown
to look more like each other over time and the
researchers ensured that the participants indeed
made judgements on the basis of facial features
rather than any other criteria, and to the
researchers’ satisfaction, the participants, were
able to tell who was married to whom after 25
years with enough precision that it exceeded
chance or guessing.
“When couples spend a lot of time together they
develop empathy and start to experience the
same emotions together, most of the time, such
as stress, anxiety, sadness and even happiness.
Since these emotions affect their face features,
they start to look alike after years of being
together,” Zajonc said.
It was also revealed that the more marital
happiness that the couple said they had, the
more likely they were to have increased in their
physical similarity.
The young couples showed only a chance
similarity to each other, the study found, while
the judges found a definite resemblance between
the couples who had been married a quarter-
century. While the resemblances were not
dramatic, some seemed to involve subtle shifts in
facial wrinkles and other facial contours, clear
enough that the judges were able to match
husbands and wives when the couples were older
than when they were newly married, and the
resemblances were greater in some couples than
in others, the study found.
In support, he points to the finding in his study
that those couples who were found to resemble
each other most greatly after 25 years were also
those who reported the happiest marriages.
Zajonc contends that this mimicry is sustained in
married couples because experiencing the same
emotional state is reinforced by its effects in
strengthening feelings of closeness.
Factors considered in assessing what could make
two people who are not related come to look like
one another included similar diet, similar
environment and disposition, but the researchers
settled on empathy, considering that couples
composed of people who feel for one another
would be more inclined to mimic one another’s
facial expressions, which tend to leave evidence
of their presence over time.
In other words, if your partner has a good sense
of humour and laughs a lot, he or she will
probably develop laugh lines around the mouth,
and so will you.
Other experts, mostly psychologists, agree that
shared emotions could gradually sculpture the
faces of a couple to become more similar, and
that common life experiences over the years can
alter facial musculature and wrinkle patterns,
leading to an increased resemblance.
According to Dr. Ekman, such a process is likely
to occur in a married couple. “There is no
question that we unconsciously use our facial
muscles in the same way as the person we are
looking at,” he said.
A study by some scientists at the University of
Liverpool in 2006 concluded that, “possessing
personality traits that are attractive may be
causal in making a face attractive.”
The study has been greeted with divergent views,
while some people see this idea as barbaric, most
see it as a very sweet, attractive and true study.
http://www.punchng.com/entertainment/saturday-breeze/why-couples-look-alike-after-many-years-of-marriage/
Re: Why Couples Look Alike After Many Years Of Marriage! by opportunist: 5:19pm On Aug 10, 2014
same reason why sugar daddies look young and supple while their mistresses look older than thei age: blood mixing not some wrinkle s*it
Re: Why Couples Look Alike After Many Years Of Marriage! by b3llo(m): 12:15am On Aug 11, 2014
Recombination of their life

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