# Resemblance to your parents (appearance and personality) **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 16, 2015, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639 "2015-06-16T01:34:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/1 "2015-06-16T01:34:54Z")
I’m like my father in appearance and personality. It’s pretty much a case of “like father, like son.” How about you - are you more similar to your father or mother, and how? ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/2 "2015-06-16T02:18:14Z")
None of the above, although, to my intense dissatisfaction, I smell quite a bit like my father. ---
**Author:** ![carlotta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/898d66/32.png) [@carlotta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carlotta)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/3 "2015-06-16T02:24:03Z")
I look more like my mother, but I also have resemblances to my father. Oddly, though both of them have black hair, I and all my brother have boring sandy brown hair. In personality I resemble my father much more, but I get along well with my mother (so does my dad). ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/4 "2015-06-16T03:06:12Z")
I’m told I’m more like my grandfather in personality (though he died before I was born). My looks are pretty much my own. ---
**Author:** ![stui\_magpie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stui_magpie/32/11010_2.png) [@stui\_magpie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stui_magpie)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/5 "2015-06-16T03:34:50Z")
Facially I’m more like my father than my mother, although he was 5’7" and I’m 6’3". Personality wise I throw more to my paternal grandfather, which is interesting because my son throws more to my dad ---
**Author:** ![Silvorange](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@Silvorange](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silvorange)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/6 "2015-06-16T04:29:52Z")
I am a woman, but I look like my dad, except for the beard. He doesn’t have one. ---
**Author:** ![kopek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kopek/32/337_2.png) [@kopek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kopek)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/7 "2015-06-16T04:40:23Z")
Dad and I were close enough to each other in most things that it could frighten people - and us sometimes. And in terms of voice we would sometimes have fun with it. A friend called his number instead of mine once and Dad took off on this five minute routine of chain-yanking that earned him an extra basket of flowers at his funeral from my buddy. ---
**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/8 "2015-06-16T04:46:22Z")
My mom and brother have olive skin and jet - black hair. My dad and I have pale skin and light brown, crazy curly hair. And blue eyes. Mom’s family is short and fat, dad’s family is tall and thin. I am tall and fat. Winning! Personality, probably dad. Anxious and uptight. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/9 "2015-06-16T04:51:45Z")
I look enough like my father that anyone could tell we were related (and not like my mother, worse luck, since she had a nice strong jawline and a straight nose). But I have spent most of my adult life trying very hard not to have his personality. ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 11:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/10 "2015-06-16T11:53:32Z")
Photos of my Dad from Korea are often thought to be of me reenacting. I am told I inherited his temperment and sense of humor. I know I got his appreciation for pin-up pictures and beer. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 12:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/11 "2015-06-16T12:01:41Z")
I totally take after my mother in appearance and personality. That answers the OP. But, further, I take after my father in musical talent. I take after neither of them in my skills with languages, where I’m entirely my own woman. Same goes for my love for science and science fiction, flair for unconventional thought and satire, political activism, and queer sexuality. From their point of view I must appear some kind of mutant. ---
**Author:** ![Octarine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/22d042/32.png) [@Octarine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Octarine)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 12:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/12 "2015-06-16T12:23:26Z")
I don’t look like anyone in my family. My sister is an almost carbon copy of my mom, though. Personality-wise, we’re all anxious wrecks. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 12:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/13 "2015-06-16T12:41:44Z")
Male. Mums skin tone and hair (thank god!) and Dad’s body type. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/14 "2015-06-16T12:43:09Z")
Physically, I resemble a younger version of my father a fair bit, except that he was about three inches taller, I’m in better shape (but not as strong), and he had a full beard which I lack (this last is a deliberate choice, so as to distance myself from him). I don’t have much direct resemblance to my mother, but I do have some to one of her brothers and to her father. In personality, I got my intuition for physics from my mother (she literally has the best physics intuition of anyone I’ve ever met, despite having almost no formal training in it), and most of my analytic ability from my father. Neither of them is nearly as nerdy as I, though I’ve long suspected that nerdity is a recessive trait. I also, knock wood, appear to have avoided the particular varieties of mental illness to which my father fell victim, though I’m not qualified to say whether I might not have some other problems of my own. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/15 "2015-06-16T13:18:33Z")
Both of my parents were artists, and so am I. It wasn’t for many years till it was pointed out to me that my art contains elements common to both parents. My father’s art was very “graphic” and sometimes geometric; my mother’s art was very organic and natural. Mine tends toward his, but with obvious elements of hers (in spite of totally different media). I look like my maternal grandfather, but have personality similar to my father (without his atrocious temper, and with an added handful of gay). ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/16 "2015-06-16T13:23:29Z")
When I don’t smile, I am physically the carbon copy of my biological mother at my age. When I smile, though, I look nothing like her. So I smile as often as I can. My personality is actually an amalgam of the three women who raised me. I never met my real dad. I get a few things from my adopted dad - stuff you don’t have to inherit, like a love of driving. ---
**Author:** ![WOOKINPANUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wookinpanub/32/132_2.png) [@WOOKINPANUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WOOKINPANUB)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/17 "2015-06-16T13:45:05Z")
I don’t know my who my biological parents are but apparently my mother was tall and blonde, so I must take after my father as I’m short and brunette. Obviously I don’t resemble anyone in my adopted family, though many people who didn’t know we weren’t blood related insisted I look like my dad. I don’t; he was just very tan and I have olive skin. I get practicality, love of language and reading, and a penchant for Englishmen from my mother. From my father I get my sense of humor and (I think anyway)kind heart. ---
**Author:** ![gallows\_fodder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8c91f0/32.png) [@gallows\_fodder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gallows_fodder)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/18 "2015-06-16T14:48:51Z")
When my mom was alive, we’d often meet people together who insisted we look alike, but neither she nor I agreed with them. She and I would occasionally stand next to each other in front of a mirror to see what features people could think we have in common, and we couldn’t find anything! Well, we both had dark hair and eyes, but that was it (and her hair and eyes were lighter than mine). We both had large eyes, too, but they were shaped differently. In reality, I look like my father, and more specifically, like his mother. We have very similar features from the nose down, and I have my grandmother’s square jaw and nearly-black eyes. The only features I get from my mother are her long eyelashes, the exact shape of her fingers and hands, and her bodily proportions. My mom and dad each used to say my personality was like the other parent’s. I think I have a mix of both of their personalities, plus traits of my own. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![stillownedbysetters](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/41988e/32.png) [@stillownedbysetters](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stillownedbysetters)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/19 "2015-06-16T14:50:41Z")
I look like a doppleganger of my father’s mother and my oldest son looks exactly like my dad. The only recognizable contributions from my mother are my voice (I sound very much like she did) and my musical talent (dad was tone deaf). In personality, I’m a dead ringer for my mother’s mother. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2015, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639/20 "2015-06-16T15:26:06Z")
I am like my father in appearance, but like neither in personality. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resemblance-to-your-parents-appearance-and-personality/722639.md?page=2)