Everybody Clap Your Hands:
New Research Uses Finger Length to Divine Sexuality

BY HEATHER K. PEAKE

A new study out of the
University of California at

Berkeley is going to have a lot
4 of people scrutinizing their

hands.

Dr. Marc Breedlove’s
hypothesis is simple: high lev-
els of male hormones in utero
can be a causal factor in the
development of homosexuali-
ty.

But it was the research
method cited in his controver-
sial paper, which appeared in
last month’s issue of Nature,
that lit up the eyes of media
people around the world:
Breedlove, a professor of psy-
chiatry who studies the biolo-
gy of sexual orientation, mea-
sured the fingers of gay men
and women.

He and his student assis-
tants conducted their research
in the summer of 1999. Armed
with detailed questionnaires
and a portable copier, they
attended several San Francisco
street fairs, and eventually
interviewed 720 people.

Then, wielding a ruler,
Breedlove went to work. He
focused his attention on two
digits: the index finger, desig-
nated 2D, and the ring finger,
called 4D. The length of these
fingers has long been known
to be controlled by male hor-
mones known as androgens
2D:4D (no, it’s not a droid
from Star Wars).

Usually, a woman’s index
finger is the same length as her
ring finger. In the typical male,
the ring finger is considerably
longer than the index finger.

Breedlove’s study found
that lesbians tend to have a
more “masculine” 2D:4D ratio
— a longer ring finger. This is a
clear indication that some
women were exposed to a
higher level of androgen in the
womb.

In gay men, the evidence
was less clear-cut. Sometimes
finger length was indistin-

Got Questions?

guishable from heterosexual
men; other times, the differ-
ence was marked.

“This calls into question all
of our cultural assumptions
that gay men are feminine,”
Breedlove said.

The Womb’s Memory

The Berkeley study con-
firmed research conducted
back in the 1990s showing that
a high proportion of gay men
have several older brothers.
Breedlove found that the
smaller 2D:4D radio was seen
only in cases where there were
two or more older brothers.

“It was a big surprise to me
that the finger measures would
follow the epidemiology so
closely,” he said.

“We think it is inescapable
that the mother’s body is
remembering how many sons
she has carried before, and
somehow she is then increas-
ing the amount of androgen
that each subsequent son sees
before birth,” the Nature arti-
cle concluded.

“So the fascinating ques-
tions are: where is the memory
being stored in the mother’s
body and what is she doing to
change the amount of andro-
gen that each subsequent son
sees.”

While Breedlove’s conclu-
sions are interesting, they do
not constitute absolute proof
of a biological basis for homo-
sexuality — as even Breedlove
concedes.

“There is no gene that
forces a person to be gay or
straight,” he said. “I believe
there are many social and psy-
chological, as well as biologi-
cal, factors that make up sexu-
al preference.”

“Having said that, these
data do suggest that there are

people in the world who are ‘

gay because of fetal androgen
levels.”

Look for the answer on

No Simple Answers

Other researchers disagree.
University of Liverpool scien-
tist John Manning says he has
found exactly the opposite: in
his study, gay men’s finger
length tended to be more
“feminine,” meaning 2D and
4D were about the same
length. He believes that both
high and low levels of andro-

gen may influence sexual pref-

CFCIICC.

take into account ethnic varia-
tions in finger measures. “The
geographical differences
swamps the sex difference,” he
says. “There’s more difference
between a Pole and a Finn than
a man and a woman.”

Solving the mystery will be «

hard. “I think this is a possibil-
ity,” Dr. Richard Sharpe of
Edinburgh University told the
BBC. “But no one has actually
measured the levels of andro-
gens in [fetuses] or the women
— you can imagine it is difficult
to do — so this is all specula-

A tion. It may be informed spec-

ulation, but I think when we
get on a subject as touchy as
sexual orientation, we need to
clearly define what is specula-
tion and what is fact.”

Breedlove himself warned
that this data should not be
misused. “There are plenty of
gay men who are first-born,
many straight men with older
brothers and many women
whose fingers give no clue to
their sexual orientation,” he
said. “This is not a test to be
used on your friends and
neighbors.” V

 

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