The length of a girl's ring finger could
be an indicator of her future sporting potential,
researchers at King's College London said.
In the largest study
of its kind, hand measurements of 607 female
twins aged 25-79 from the UK were compared
with the women's lifetime sporting achievements.
The findings, published in the British Journal
of Sports Medicine, found that women with
ring fingers longer than their index fingers
had performed better at running and associated
running sports such as soccer and tennis.
In women the ring finger is commonly shorter
or the same length as the index finger, while
in men the ring finger is generally longer.
The report said detection of sporting potential
by examining the ratio between the index and
ring fingers "could help identify talented
individuals at a pre-competitive stage."
The reasons for the findings were unclear,
said one of the report's authors, Professor
Tim Spector from the Twins Research Unit at
King's College, who said he was originally
skeptical about the link to sporting ability.
"Previous studies have suggested the change
in finger length was due to changes in testosterone
levels in the womb," he said.
But he said the unit had found in a separate
study of twins that finger length was largely
inherited, possibly explaining why sporting
parents often have sporting children.
"We found that finger length was 70 percent
heritable with little influence of the womb
environment," he said.
"This suggests that genes are the main factor
and that finger length is a marker of your
genes."
He said no specific candidate genes had been
identified for the link and that multiple
genes were probably responsible.
Previous studies looking at the link between
finger length and sporting ability have mainly
focused on men.
A study published in 2001 of 304 English
professional soccer players found they had
a significantly larger ring-to-index-finger
ratio than a control group of 533 other men.
Other studies in men have shown the ratio
of the ring finger to the index finger can
be associated with varied traits such as sexuality,
musical ability and vulnerability to certain
diseases.
