Reply to "Boys are always taller than their mothers"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]A friend of mine insists that boys are ALWAYS taller than their mothers.[/quote]

If a boy has a tall father and a short mother, the boy is likely to grow up to be medium (but may be tall or may be short), but if the boy has a tall mother and a short father, then the boy always grows up to be tall? I would love for her to explain how that happens.[/quote]

I think it's more the idea that a medium height man is taller than a tall woman.  So, a boy with a 90th %ile father (6' 2") and a 10th %ile mother (5' 0") might grow up to be 50th %ile (5' 9.3"), which is a lot taller than his mother.  While a boy who has 10%ile father (5 ' 5.5 ") and a 90th %ile mother (5' 7.5") will also grow up to be 50 %ile (5' 9.3") which is still a little taller than his mother.

A woman who taller than a 50th %ile man, is rare. Only 2.5% of women are that tall, and most of them will have taller than average sons.  They'd have to marry a man around 5' 3.5"  to average her out, and assuming that people don't pick their spouses based on height (not a safe assumption) the likelihood of a couple like that would be less than 1/10th of 1%.

Having said that, my adult son and I are both 5'6".  He's adopted, but his birth mother was taller than I am.  So, we're sort of a counter example, but he had pretty severe asthma as a kid which may have contributed to his low height. [/quote]

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