Journal
JOURNAL OF HUMAN EVOLUTION
Volume 60, Issue 5, Pages 605-611Publisher
ACADEMIC PRESS LTD- ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD
DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2010.12.008
Keywords
Great apes; Handedness; Asymmetry; Laterality; Language evolution
Categories
Funding
- NIH [NS-42867, HD-60563, HD-56232, U42]
- Anderson Cancer Center
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Whether or not nonhuman primates exhibit population-level handedness remains a topic of considerable scientific debate. Here, we examined handedness for coordinated bimanual actions in a sample of 777 great apes including chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas, and orangutans. We found population-level right-handedness in chimpanzees, bonobos and gorillas, but left-handedness in orangutans. Directional biases in handedness were consistent across independent samples of apes within each genus. We suggest that, contrary to previous claims, population-level handedness is evident in great apes but differs among species as a result of ecological adaptations associated with posture and locomotion. We further suggest that historical views of nonhuman primate handedness have been too anthropocentric, and we advocate for a larger evolutionary framework for the consideration of handedness and other aspects of hemispheric specialization among primates. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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