Assortative mating is a non-random process of partner/sexual selection in which a person selects a mate based on similarities in traits. Such as:
- physical characteristics: height(height-mating-preferences), eye color, facial features, weight.
- social factors: religion, race, socioeconomic status (affluent, middle-class)
- cognitive abilities: IQ, educational attainment
- sport preferences: volleyball, gym
Assortative mating can be positive and negative. Positive assortative mating is basically inclination towards similarities in traits, whereas negative assortative mating is inclination towards dissimilar traits.
An example of positive: Taller men are more likely to mate with taller women. Although, it seems it’s the case when with increasing height difference, the preferred partner height also increases. But according to Male-taller Norm (Female-shorter Norm), women prefer men to be taller than themselves and men prefer women to be shorter than themselves.1
Where X comes from? Well, this whole pattern I discovered in a paper it was mentioned in and then followed up by me up to the Wiki article.
It reminds me of volleyball payers’ tendency to date with each other. Pankov, Lobbinski, Kadochkina, all of them are in a relationship with another volleyball players. And that is to be expected because they spend most of their time on a volleyball court. But the core basis of this tendency is Assortative mating, that shows their inclinations towards individuals with similarities in sport, height, body type.
It is similar to people’s tendency to use a particular service, product, food that we find familiar and similar to us or our experience. Moreover, Gemini 1.5 Pro showed me that dating apps use algorithms that consider user characteristics to suggest a compatible couple chosen in according to assortative mating tendency.
It is the opposite of Disassortative mating that is a preference for a partner with dissimilar traits. For instance, in some animal species, larger females mate with smaller males, illustrating negative assortative mating based on size.
It is relevant because this give an understanding of human mating preferences. How they are likely to choose partner. Who they will likely be attracted to? How genetics and social structures are being formed: tall children are born by tall parents who mated ‘assortatively’. Affluent children almost every time are result of mating affluent man and female. And also it helps you to discern patterns of social structures.
Footnotes
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Stulp, Gert, Abraham P. Buunk, Thomas V. Pollet, Daniel Nettle, and Simon Verhulst. “Are Human Mating Preferences with Respect to Height Reflected in Actual Pairings?” PLoS ONE 8, no. 1 (January 16, 2013): e54186. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0054186 ↩