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Birth order and hand preference in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes): implications for pathological models of handedness
1Department of Psychology, Berry College, USA. whopkins@berry.edu
Journal of Comparative Psychology (Washington, D.C. : 1983)
|September 20, 2000
Abstract:
The effect of birth order on hand preference was assessed in a sample of 154 captive-born chimpanzees. Subjects were classified as first, middle, or latter born using 2 classification criteria based on their birth order. Hand preference was measured using a task that elicited coordinated bimanual actions. Significant birth-order effects were found for both classification criteria, with first- and latter-born subjects exhibiting a lesser degree of right-handedness compared with middle-born subjects. These data suggest that biological rather than sociological factors play a greater role in explaining the observed birth-order effects on hand preference in humans.