“It
does seem that everyone is having twins. It could be that people are having
their babies when they’re older (I don’t really go with this one, because my
mother didn’t have me until she was 35, and most Irish women who were having 6
and 7 children were having children in their late thirties, or even early
forties, and there didn’t seem to be that many twins).

It
could be that people are having their first pregnancy when they’re older
(Maybe the biological clock says, gosh, at long last a pregnancy, better make
the most of it and produce two).

Or
I have this sort of way out theory that just as there were more boys born
directly after the war (so that the population equilibrium was quickly restored
– New Scientist did a series on this a coupe of years ago, which doesn’t mean
it’s true of course), could it possibly be that less people have babies, so
those who have babies have more of them. I’ve nothing really to base this on.

Or
how about natural selection. Twins have a high level of family support, develop
advanced social skills, and make their parents very happy, so that they in turn
enter into happy successful relationships and so the “twin gene” gets
passed on and multiplies. That’s a nice theory!

Or
it could be the pill.”

Comments

groupie

on 18 November 2005 at 09:45

There DO seem to be a lot of twins around at the moment. But my older sisters are twins, so I’ve grown up thinking it’s quite normal anyway. At their primary school – a tiny village school – there were something like 3 or 4 other sets of twins there at the same time. Perhaps you just notice twins more when you’ve got a direct connection to some?