How close are our real life mates to our ideal partners?

Science Daily reports there’s a big gap between most people’s ideal partner and the person they end up with. And the gap is bigger for women than for men:

Our ideal image of the perfect partner differs greatly from our real-life partner, according to new research from the University of Sheffield and the University of Montpellier in France. The research found that our actual partners are of a different height, weight and body mass index than those we would ideally choose.

And

The study also found that most men would rather have female partners much slimmer than they really have. Most women are not satisfied, either, but contrary to men, while some would like slimmer mates, others prefer bigger ones.

And:

For the three morphological traits studied — height, weight and body mass — men’s mating preferences were less different from their actual partner’s characteristics than females’ ones. As the authors remark, the lower dissatisfaction observed for men in this study may be restricted to some physical traits, and results could be different for other traits such as personality, political opinion or sense of humor that are also important in partner choice.