Biology – Quantitative Biology – Populations and Evolution
Scientific paper
2011-09-27
Biology
Quantitative Biology
Populations and Evolution
5 pages of text and 3 figures in manuscript, 8 pages of text and two figures in supplementary material
Scientific paper
An overwhelming majority of humans are right-handed. Numerous explanations for individual handedness have been proposed, but this population-level handedness remains puzzling. Here we use a minimal mathematical model to explain this population-level hand preference as an evolved balance between cooperative and competitive pressures in human evolutionary history. We use selection of elite athletes as a test-bed for our evolutionary model and account for the surprising distribution of handedness in many professional sports. Our model predicts strong lateralization in social species with limited combative interaction, and elucidates the rarity of compelling evidence for "pawedness" in the animal world.
Abrams Daniel M.
Panaggio Mark J.
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