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12 April 2006
The Tell-Tale Wedding Ring 
University of Alberta psychologist Andrew Harrell looks set to ignite more controversy with his new claim that people who do not wear wedding rings are more neglectful of children compared to those that wear them. Furthermore, Harrell says, attractive people who do not wear wedding rings are the most neglectful parents of all. Harrell is no stranger to controversy. Last year he claimed that parents are more neglectful of unattractive children than they are of attractive children; findings he says were replicated again this year. Harrell conducts his research using teams of observers placed in supermarkets, who observe and record the social interactions they see taking place around them. In this new study, "neglect" was measured according to how often the parents/caregivers or the children (estimated to be aged between 1 and 7) wandered out of sight or were more than 10 feet away from each other - a distance Harrell said was too great to prevent most accidents. It turned out that an average of 14 per cent of all caregivers lost sight of their charges at least once; but for young, attractive female caretakers without rings, that figure rose to 19 percent. Harrell said this was a statistically significant increase. "Past research suggests that the absence of a wedding ring in North American culture is indicative of a lack of emotional commitment to marriage," he explained. "Our research shows that it may also be an indicator of a lack of a commitment to one's family, including care of the children."
Wedding ring absence - interpreted as an interest in establishing social or sexual ties outside of marriage - may have the inadvertent consequence of diminishing attentiveness to children, believes Harrell. "And it's not surprising that this distraction occurs even in a mundane setting like a supermarket, which is more than a place to purchase bananas and cereal. It can also be a place for social encounters and maybe even a romantic rendezvous," he added. Source: University of Alberta
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