واگرایی بین ترجیحات قانونی و ترجیحات همسر: پیش زمینه های تکامل و یا جامعه پذیری و عوارض؟

When it comes to mate choice, parents value certain traits differently in a mate for their children, than their children in a mate for themselves. This is not surprising, given that parents, by virtue of being older, have been socialized in a different context and have more life experiences than their children, so they may have come to see certain traits differently than the latter. Apart from socialization and experience effects, it has been argued that these findings also reflect evolved predispositions effects; that is, evolutionary pressures have resulted in in-law and mate preferences to diverge over specific traits. Using novel research designs and a new instrument to measure preferences, the present work attempts to provide support for this hypothesis. More specifically, evidence from three independent studies indicates that sexually mature individuals who have children alter their preferences over specific traits on the basis of whether they act as parents or mate-seekers. These findings indicate that the divergence between mate and in-law preferences also reflects evolved predisposition effects. Furthermore, this research has identified, for the first time, that ‘being family oriented’ constitutes another dimension of disagreement over mating.

Individuals choose mates, but their choices frequently do not find the agreement of their parents, one reason being that children’s mate preferences do not match their parents’ in-law preferences (Apostolou, 2014b). In particular, children appear to value traits such as beauty, in a mate more than their parents in an in-law, while parents value traits such as having a good family background more in an in-law, than their children in a spouse (Apostolou, 2008a, Apostolou, 2008b, Buunk et al., 2008, Buunk and Solano, 2010, Dubbs, 2010 and Perilloux et al., 2011). Such disagreement is to some degree expected, as parents are older, which means that they have been socialized in a different context and have more life experiences than their children. Consequently, they may come to see and evaluate the importance of traits such as looks, differently than their daughters and sons who are younger and less experienced.