Like Father, Like Daughter

Have you ever heard of someone saying that you look like your mom or dad or grandpaa or a distant relative? We look alike yet with variations. Why?

Is the texture of your hair more like your mother or your father? Are your eyes look similar to that of your dad or your mom? How do you sneeze, Like your dad or mom?

Have you ever thought about these similarities? Why do these exist? Why a distant relative at a party says, “your daughter is a true copy of her father”? or why does your grandmother compares your activities to your father younger self?

The answer to all these questions is Genetics  (a subject you’ll learn in higher classes). We are made of genes that we receive from both of our parents and thus we look alike. You may have heard people complementing, he’s more like his mother, her eyes resemble that of her maternal grandmother, oh he walks like his grandfather, he has a physique like that of his father, etc. All these are due to genetics. The materials we receive from our parents before birth get intermingled and we look like both of them, having qualities of both.

But have you ever met twins? They look exactly the same (at times). Why does this happen?

The answer to this is: twins are born together, nourished together. If they have received the same intermingled materials (as in case of identical twins) they’ll look alike. They’ll have exactly same color of eyes, texture of hair, pitch of voice etc. Yes, their height may vary, their health might vary depending on the care and food they take after birth. BUt the characters they develop before birth are approximately similar.

That’s the reason why people complement about you looking similar to a particular person.

Sometimes they also compare you to your maternal or paternal aunt or uncle. Why?

This is because, your parents have received genetic materials from their parents, who have also delivered their genetic materials to their other children, i.e., the aunts and uncles. And thus when you receive materials from your parents, characters dominant in them may become dominant in you too and thus you have features similar to them.

All these similarities and variations is just the matter of Genetics, an interesting subject you’ll get to study in higher classes. From plants to animals, all are connected to genetics. Your activities, features, characters and almost all the external and internal characteristics are concerned with genetics. This is the basic of genetics, study well, for it’s a bright field to pursue in your future career.