Dylan Sprouse's girlfriend looks more like his twin than his actual twin does. Photo / Twitter
Dylan Sprouse's girlfriend looks more like his twin than his actual twin does. Photo / Twitter
"I've decided your boyfriend kinda looks like he could be your brother," my friend told me as she shovelled Maltesers in her mouth.
"I think it's the blond hair thing that freaks me out."
It wasn't the first time someone had remarked on the similarities between my boyfriend and I. Sure, perhaps, if you wrote our key features down on paper — tall, blond, pale, blue-eyed, gangly, pale again — we'd sound like relatives. But in person? I just don't see it, reports news.com.au.
My elder sister is told she looks just like her boyfriend all the time. My little brother looks a bit like his girlfriend, too. I have plenty of friends who look a hell of a lot like their partners. A former co-worker looks so much like her partner I really think they should look into an ancestry website just to be sure.
And, in case you missed the buzz on Twitter earlier this month, the world thinks actor Dylan Sprouse has a girlfriend who looks more like his twin than his actual twin.
That girlfriend is supermodel Barbara Palvin and the internet does have a point.
More than 100,000 people revelled in the pair's likeness, before turning to other examples of celebrity couples who look, well, semi-related. Tom Brady and Gisele Bündchen, Justin Timberlake and Jessica Biel, Kristen Bell and Dax Shepard, Alexis Bledel and Vincent Kartheiser, Brad Pitt and half the girlfriends he's had since he was 17 …
They even have the same hairdresser. Photo / Getty Images
As you read this right now, you're sitting in one of two camps. The first is populated with people like me — the ones who are currently perspiring, thinking 'my partner could totally pass as my cousin'. Then there's the second group — filled with wide-eyed concern that anyone in the first group is in desperate need of psychological assessment.
Before any Camp A folk begin dialling the closest mental health professional, let it be known — some studies show that humans gravitate towards those who are similar to us on almost every level.
According to researchers who worked on a German study in 2016, we can more easily recognise emotions in faces similar to our own, affording us a greater "neural vocabulary" with those who look like us. This level of understanding and connection feeds into a mutual attraction and, ultimately, the foundation of a pretty successful relationship.
Not only are these two gorgeous together, they look like they match. Photo / AP
At the crux of it, the principle is quite simple: If the face we're engaging with feels and looks familiar, we can understand it more. When we correctly identify a person's emotions, it triggers the brain's reward system, positively reinforcing the interaction — a signal that we have synergy with the person we're talking to. That they get us. That they might even like us back.
But attraction based on familiarity extends further than romantic love — look at your "work wife", best mate, or gym buddy — do they bear a resemblance to you? Do you have similar eyes, teeth, skin? Do they wear their hair the same way you do? Walk and talk like you do?
According to researchers from the University of Toronto, we don't just pick our significant others based on physical similarities — we're more likely to form lasting friendships with those who look like us.
OK, there's a height difference here, but Kristen Bell and her husband Dax Shepard have pretty similar features. Photo / Getty Images
A study published in Personality and Social Psychology in August last year indicated that, in many cases, "facial appearance contributes to group membership".
When comparing the faces of men at six different fraternities at Midwestern University, it became apparent that the presence of certain physical features depended on fraternities. Psychologists found that male students had, on some level, formed groups based on appearance. Indeed, the men were subconsciously pulled towards the peers that looked the most familiar — the most like them — and instinctively made those peers their nearest and dearest.
And that's before we acknowledge a 2014 study by the University of Colorado that found married couples had fewer differences in their DNA compared with non-coupled pairs. Yep — it's called genetic assortative mating — and it's more common than you might think.
So, Dylan Sprouse and Barbara Palvin, if you're troubled by the fact you look more like brother and sister than boyfriend and girlfriend — don't worry.
