weird science - what your fingers say about you...
So, the other day I happened to come across an article online about a study done linking certain personality traits to finger length.
I know this sounds totally new-age psychic palmistry voodoo, but as it turns out there have been a fair number of really interesting studies done on the topic of correlations between finger length and various other things.
What it comes down to is testosterone. People who are exposed to more testosterone in the womb tend to have a longer ring finger than index finger. Less testosterone, vice versa. Naturally you can conclude that men tend to have longer ring fingers and women tend to have longer index fingers. But fetal testosterone levels are also connected to other things, like personality traits and (arguably) sexual orientation. So here we go...
Five Interesting Things Indicated by Finger Length
1. Men with long fingers (in relation to their height) and longer ring fingers are more likely to suffer from depression. This correlation doesn't hold true for women - apparently there is no known link between exposure to testosterone and depression in females.
2. Women with shorter ring fingers than index fingers tend to have higher fertility. For men, its those with longer ring fingers that are more fertile.
3. Lesbians tend to have longer ring fingers than index fingers. Straight women tend to have about equal fingers or longer index fingers. But apparently for men, only gay men with older brothers have much shorter index fingers. (This, at first glance, sounds suspicious, but I suppose there's something logical in there related to all the brothers coming from the same womb?)
4. Kids with longer ring fingers than index fingers (i.e. kids who have been exposed to more testosterone) are likely to score higher on the math part of the SAT than the verbal part, kids with longer index fingers are likely to have higher verbal scores. Incidentally, according to a human sexuality textbook, women are apparently more likely to be "good" language learners, good spellers, and use larger vocabularies than men.
5. Men with noticeably longer ring fingers than index fingers are more likely to have aggressive personalities. There isn't an equivalent correlation for women though.
If anyone is interested, here are the articles I found.
*About depression and fertility.
*On sexual orientation and finger length.
*Predicting SAT results.
*Aggressive personalities.
I'd be interested to hear people's thoughts about the research, or if they know of any other similar findings, and also what your own fingers indicate about you.
Apparently I'm pretty fertile and more inclined to verbosity. ;-)
I know this sounds totally new-age psychic palmistry voodoo, but as it turns out there have been a fair number of really interesting studies done on the topic of correlations between finger length and various other things.
What it comes down to is testosterone. People who are exposed to more testosterone in the womb tend to have a longer ring finger than index finger. Less testosterone, vice versa. Naturally you can conclude that men tend to have longer ring fingers and women tend to have longer index fingers. But fetal testosterone levels are also connected to other things, like personality traits and (arguably) sexual orientation. So here we go...
Five Interesting Things Indicated by Finger Length
1. Men with long fingers (in relation to their height) and longer ring fingers are more likely to suffer from depression. This correlation doesn't hold true for women - apparently there is no known link between exposure to testosterone and depression in females.
2. Women with shorter ring fingers than index fingers tend to have higher fertility. For men, its those with longer ring fingers that are more fertile.
3. Lesbians tend to have longer ring fingers than index fingers. Straight women tend to have about equal fingers or longer index fingers. But apparently for men, only gay men with older brothers have much shorter index fingers. (This, at first glance, sounds suspicious, but I suppose there's something logical in there related to all the brothers coming from the same womb?)
4. Kids with longer ring fingers than index fingers (i.e. kids who have been exposed to more testosterone) are likely to score higher on the math part of the SAT than the verbal part, kids with longer index fingers are likely to have higher verbal scores. Incidentally, according to a human sexuality textbook, women are apparently more likely to be "good" language learners, good spellers, and use larger vocabularies than men.
5. Men with noticeably longer ring fingers than index fingers are more likely to have aggressive personalities. There isn't an equivalent correlation for women though.
If anyone is interested, here are the articles I found.
*About depression and fertility.
*On sexual orientation and finger length.
*Predicting SAT results.
*Aggressive personalities.
I'd be interested to hear people's thoughts about the research, or if they know of any other similar findings, and also what your own fingers indicate about you.
Apparently I'm pretty fertile and more inclined to verbosity. ;-)