ArticleScientific reports2021
Differences in digit ratios between gay men who prefer receptive versus insertive sex roles indicate a role for prenatal androgen.
Article in Scientific reports, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers.
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14 citing papers in PubMed, 21 citations in OpenAlex.
- Early life stress modulates social behavior via oxytocin and arginine vasopressin in males.European archives of psychiatry and clinical neuroscience · 2026Article
- Biodevelopmental Correlates of Sexual Orientation in Men: Evidence from a Polish Sample.Archives of sexual behavior · 2025Article
- Editorial: Hormones and person perception.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Sexual orientation is associated with 2D:4D finger length ratios in both sexes: an updated and expanded meta-analysis.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Review
- Examining the Fraternal Birth Order Effect and Sexual Orientation: Insights from an East European Population.Archives of sexual behavior · 2024Article
- Digit Ratio (2D:4D; Right-Left 2D:4D) and Multiple Phenotypes for Same-Sex Attraction: The BBC Internet Study Revisited.Archives of sexual behavior · 2024Article
- The Biodevelopment of Sexual Orientation: Beyond the Known Horizon.Archives of sexual behavior · 2023Article
- Carving the Biodevelopment of Same-Sex Sexual Orientation at Its Joints.Archives of sexual behavior · 2023Article
- Using Animal Models to Study the Interplay Between the Biodevelopmental Pathways Underlying Human Sexual Orientation.Archives of sexual behavior · 2023Article
- Hormonal, Genetic, Immunological: An Array of Mechanisms but How Do They Interact, If at All?Archives of sexual behavior · 2023Article
- The association of prenatal amniotic sex hormones and digit ratio (2D:4D) in children aged 5 to 70 months: A longitudinal study.PloS one · 2023Article
- Evidence for Perinatal Steroid Influence on Human Sexual Orientation and Gendered Behavior.Cold Spring Harbor perspectives in biology · 2022Review
- An anthropometric study of sexual orientation and gender identity in Thailand.Scientific reports · 2021Article
- Parental Income and the Sexual Behavior of Their Adult Children: A Trivers-Willard Perspective.Evolutionary psychology : an international journal of evolutionary approaches to psychology and behaviorArticle
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Among non-human mammals, exposure to androgens during critical periods of development leads to gynephilia (attraction to females), whereas the absence or low levels of prenatal androgens leads to androphilia (attraction to males). However, in humans, retrospective markers of prenatal androgens have only been associated with gynephilia among women, but not with androphilia among men. Here, we asked whether an indirect indication of prenatal androgen exposure, 2D:4D, differs between subsets of gay men delineated by anal sex role (ASR). ASR was used as a proxy for subgroups because ASR groups tend to differ in other measures affected by brain sexual differentiation, such as gender conformity. First, we replicated the finding that gay men with a receptive ASR preference (bottoms) report greater gender nonconformity (GNC) compared to gay men with an insertive ASR preference (tops). We then found that Tops have a lower (male-typical) average right-hand digit ratio than Bottoms, and that among all gay men the right-hand 2D:4D correlated with GNC, indicating that a higher (female-typical) 2D:4D is associated with increased GNC. Differences were found between non-exclusive and exclusive same-sex attraction and GNC, and ASR group differences on digit ratios do not reach significance when all non-heterosexual men are included in the analyses, suggesting greater heterogeneity in the development of non-exclusive same-sex sexual orientations. Overall, results support a role for prenatal androgens, as approximated by digit ratios, in influencing the sexual orientation and GNC of a subset of gay men.
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