I’m almost positive that you have heard it said before that all blondes girls are stupid. It is a stereotype which is a stranger to none. Having lighter hair, this is something that obviously I take offense too. But there is good new, scientific studies have recently proved that such a common stereotype is nothing but a myth.

Physically speaking, a persons hair color is determined by pigments called Eumelanin and Phenomelanin. Eumelanin is the pigment which is responsible for depicting black hair. Phenomelanin is linked to red or yellow colored pigment. The colors that show are dependent on the amounts of pigment which are present and how close together the Eumelanin and Phenomelanin are placed. Genetically speaking, parents have a role in determining what color hair their offspring possesses. These types of genes are neither recessive or dominant, which explains why a child may have a different color hair than there parents do. The genes are additive which I believe can be a little confusing. Blonde or red hair, which is produced with Phenomelanin, is given to offspring as an allele gene. Not to my surprise, only European Americans are able to possess the allele which would cause someone to have blonde hair. If you are curious about how hair color is created, black hair is depicted when the Eumelanin pigment is very tightly and closely packed. To be born with red hair, one must have a large amount of loosely packed Phenomelanin. Blonde hair has the least amount of pigment which would mean the fragments are very spaced out.

A study that was conducted in Standford University, California shows that having blonde hair is completely dependent on letters in our genetic coding. A blonde posses a guanine on their twelfth chromosome rather than an adenine. The twelfth chromosome only is able to effect ones hair follicle. Which in turn means that despite the popular belief, these letters have seemingly no effect on any other genetic traits. The study that was conducted used mice as their participants because this type of genetic testing would not be ethical on human beings. The researchers were able to predict the exact genetic difference in a blonde and use that information to test their hypothesis out on the mice. Because the researchers were able to alter the color of mice fur from dark brown to blonde with the simple switch of one letter on the Kit ligand gene and everything about the mice were able to remain unchanged it can be concluded that this gene has no correlation to any other traits one may posses which includes intelligence.

I believe that this is an example of a experimental study because only one outcome was being tested and observed. The researchers genetically altered the mice and than observed the effect this change had on the color of their fur. Although I do not agree with animal testing, I believe that this study was logical and ethical to do because the researchers did not instill any harm amongst the mice. The simply altered the color of their fur.

Besides the brains that a blonde girl has, this study also debunks other stereotypes which are often targeted towards blondes. For example, all blondes have blue eyes. Because this genetic trait comes unpaired, a blonde is not guaranteed to possess blue eyes.

In conclusion, blonde hair is NOT at all linked to any other genetic trait. With that said, I think it is time to apologize to any friend who has been targeted by dumb blonde jokes because now it has been proven that simply because one has blonde hair, it does not automatically mean that they are unintelligent.

Sources:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2014/06/02/science-shatters-the-blondes-are-dumb-stereotype/

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2645779/Blondes-not-dumb-Scientists-disprove-negative-stereotype-proving-hair-colour-completely-unrelated-traits.html

http://www.boston.com/life/2014/06/04/scientific-proof-that-your-dumb-blonde-jokes-are-wrong/GEngjFhBzH09S8nP5u1F8L/story.html

http://www.livestrong.com/article/76290-hair-color-determined/