What have I learned from 20 years of parenting? Never to underestimate how wrong I can be | Emma Beddington

We often have as much in common with strangers as our relatives, according to studies - so why do we still love to say our children are like us?

How alike are parents and kids? Quite, right? Surely we all play that game. I, for example, am competitive like my dad (but without a shred of his energy); my sister got my mother's compassion and I got her lust for crispy potato products and staying in bed. My husband and his mum, meanwhile, share a lively debating style (I'm choosing my words carefully); it's why their conversations get so ... animated.

It's an assumption that transcends geography: there are the apple doesn't fall far from the tree" equivalents worldwide - mostly tree-related, although I like the Portuguese a fish's child knows how to swim".