ArticleBiology letters2019
Digit ratio (2D : 4D) and prosocial behaviour in economic games: no direct correlation with generosity, bargaining or trust-related behaviours.
Article in Biology letters, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed, 12 citations in OpenAlex.
- Interplay of polymorphisms in sex hormone receptors and facial sexual differentiation in shaping prosocial behavior.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- No relationship between the digit ratios (2D:4D) and salivary testosterone change: Study on men under an acute exercise.Scientific reports · 2020Article
- Digit ratio (2D : 4D) and prosocial behaviour in economic games: no direct correlation with generosity, bargaining or trust-related behaviours.Biology letters · 2019Article
- The digit ratio (2D:4D) and economic preferences: no robust associations in a sample of 330 women.Journal of the Economic Science Association · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Prenatal exposure to sex hormones exerts organizational effects on the brain which have observable behavioural correlates in adult life. There are reasons to expect that social behaviours-fundamental for the evolutionary success of humans-might be related to biological factors such as prenatal sex hormone exposure. Nevertheless, the existing literature is inconclusive as to whether and how prenatal exposure to testosterone and oestrogen, proxied by the second-to-fourth digit ratio (2D : 4D), may predict non-selfish behaviour. Here, we investigate this question using economic experiments with real monetary stakes and analyse five different dimensions of social behaviour in a comparatively large sample of Caucasian participants (n = 560). For both males and females, our results show no robust association between right- or left-hand 2D : 4D and generosity, bargaining or trust-related behaviours. Moreover, no differences in behaviour were found according to sex. We conclude that there is no direct correlation between 2D : 4D and these social behaviours.
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Registered trials
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