Mixed race children and their skin tone

[enigma80]

I know lots of interracial couples with one black parent, one white parent. I have noticed that mixed race children with white mothers and black fathers tend to have lighter skin than those with black mothers and white fathers. Is this something to do with genetics or just coincidence from the sample I've seen? I would suppose that because the white body is the one bearing the child that it effects the child's development in the womb. Any ideas? This is an honest query.

[brachiopod]

"I would suppose that because the white body is the one bearing the child that it effects (sic) the child's development in the womb."

Does a child become any more female "because the female body is the one bearing the child"?

[spinchimp]

Observer bias.

[Calvesy]

It depends on a gene OCA on chromosome 15. It's output, melanin, is produced locally only in the skin, iris and follicles.

This page is hardcore

http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/gene=oca2

[enigma80]

Thanks for your responses, folks. It certainly isn't observer bias; it was a realisation I came to, not something I looked out for.

Cheers.

[Skinnyminnie]

Theres no theory. It doesn't make a difference.I'm white and my daughter is mixed race but darker in skin tone than my nephew who's mother was black and father white.I don't think you can predict these things as sometimes couples with a light skinned black partner have had a quite dark skinned child and visa versa. Who knows!