As families gather round for the winter holidays, some faces may be more familiar than others. A recent study shows that the amount of social interaction between extended family members depends on whether people are related through their mother or father.
Thomas Pollet and colleagues at Newcastle University and the University of Antwerp, Belgium, investigated how far maternal grandparents and paternal grandparents will go to maintain face-to-face contact with their grandchildren. They found that maternal grandparents were willing to travel further in order to sustain frequent (daily or a few times a week) contact with their grandchildren than paternal grandparents.
Mr Pollet says, “As the festive period approaches, we can still see that family get-togethers are integral to the celebrations. Many people will be going the extra mile to ensure they meet up – and we’ve found that’s particularly important if family members are related through mothers.”
“Even in families where there has been divorce, we found consistent differences – grandparents on your mother's side make the extra effort. We believe there are psychological mechanisms at play because throughout history, women are always related by maternity whereas men can never be wholly certain they are the biological father to their children.”
The authors interpret their findings as support for psychological patterns resulting from our evolutionary history. Family members related through their mothers (matrilineal kin) are predicted to matter more than those related through their fathers (patrilineal kin). Throughout human evolution, women were always related by certain maternity, whereas men could never be wholly certain that they are the biological father. Also, maternal grandparents were always more certain than paternal grandparents that a grandchildren was related to them. Thus, maternal grandparents, especially maternal grandmothers, may go the extra mile to visit their grandchildren.
For grandparents living within 19.5 miles (30 km) of their grandchildren, over 30% of the maternal grandmothers had contact daily or a few times a week. Around 25% of the maternal grandfathers had contact daily or a few times a week. In contrast, only around 15 % of the paternal grandmothers and little more than 15% of the paternal grandfathers would have contact daily or a few times a week.
The research which is published in the latest edition of the journal
Evolutionary Psychology, was conducted on a sample of over 800 grandparents from a representative Dutch sample (The Netherlands Kinship Panel Study –
www.nkps.nl ). The analyses controlled for other factors such as grandparental and child age, marital status, and number of children.
Source: Newcastle University
Related stories:
Liver donor's family, recipient unite online
(AP) -- They were precocious toddlers, both blond-haired and blue-eyed, separated by a thousand miles between Miami and a small Kentucky town.
Grandma and grandpa are good for children
The first national survey about the relationships that adolescents have with their grandparents shows that grandparents who are involved in the upbringing of their grandchildren can contribute to a child’s well-being.
Researchers link 11 genetic variations to type 2 diabetes
Mathematicians at Michigan Technological University have developed powerful new tools for winnowing out the genes behind some of humanity’s most intractable diseases.
A helping hand from the grandparents
A team of scientists led by the University of East Anglia has discovered the existence of ‘grandparent’ helpers in the Seychelles warbler – the first time this behaviour, which rarely occurs except in humans, has been observed in birds.
Most carriers of Fanconi anemia genes are not at a higher risk of cancer
For almost 50 years, Fanconi anemia has been associated with leukemia. Not just among those who have the genetic disorder but among their family members, whose genes, they were told, made them highly susceptible to a variety of malignancies. But a new study to examine links between 13 specific Fanconi anemia genes and cancer risk has determined that in most cases, their risk of cancer is no greater than that of the rest of the population.
Savanna habitat drives birds, and perhaps others, to cooperative breeding
Delaying having kids to help raise the offspring of others seems like a bad choice if you want to reproduce, but many African starlings have adopted this strategy to deal with the unpredictable climate of their savanna habitats, according to a new study by University of California, Berkeley, and Cornell University biologists. It appears in the Aug. 21 issue of the journal
Current Biology.
Older adults encouraged to seek help for a sleep disorder
September 9th is National Grandparents Day, a day to honor grandparents across America as important members of our families and communities. Grandparents play important roles in life, including that of guardian, comforter, and mentor. As they get older, however, several aspects of their lives change, including their sleep patterns. While older adults need about seven to eight hours of sleep each night, many often get less sleep, which may make them more susceptible to health problems.
Researchers find older folks don't get the joke
It’s no laughing matter that older adults have a tougher time understanding basic jokes than do younger adults.