I've written before about the various ways of telling whether someone is gay by things like their finger length. Now it seems that there is a new way to tell if someone is gay. If you're a guy and you are looking at the top of another guys head who is currently performing oral sex on you - you can be 30% sure if he's gay or not according to this study.
Check out the abstract (I absolutely LOVE the introducing statement):
While most men prefer women as their sexual partners, some are bisexual and others are homosexuals. It has been debated for a long time whether a person's sexual preference is innate, learned, or due to a combination of both causes.
It was recently discovered that the human right-versus-left-hand use preference and the direction of scalp hair-whorl rotation develop from a common genetic mechanism. Such a mechanism controls functional specialization of brain hemispheres. Whether the same mechanism specifying mental makeup influences sexual preference was determined here by comparing hair-whorl rotation in groups enriched with homosexual men with that in males at large. Only a minority of 8.2% (n = 207) unselected 'control' group of males had counterclockwise rotation. In contrast, all three samples enriched with homosexual men exhibited highly significant (P < 0.0001), 3.6-fold excess (29.8%, n = 272) counterclockwise rotation. These results suggest that sexual preference may be influenced in a significant proportion of homosexual men by a biological/genetic factor that also controls direction of hair-whorl rotation.
Now what would this hair swirl exactly look like so you can be an informed citizen? Here's the culprit. Be on the look out for this person who may be homosexual (or more likely not homosexual).
Life Science
Comments
Just an FYI that the image you chose to represent counter-clockwise is actually clockwise...
Posted by: Matt | September 24, 2009 3:59 PM
(mopping coffee from keyboard)
Posted by: T. Bruce McNeely | September 24, 2009 4:05 PM
Haha I don't realy care what direction the hair is pointin ;) the whole thing is so stupid.
Posted by: Omnibrain | September 24, 2009 4:34 PM
Confused. Are heterosexual people thus gay in Australia?
Posted by: kamenin | September 24, 2009 4:52 PM
I'm bald. If I dig around and find a picture of the top of my head from 1975, could I use it to find out if I'm gay or not?
Posted by: george.w | September 24, 2009 5:42 PM
The swirl shown can be the result of either a counter clockwise rotation as with hurricanes in the northern hemisphere or a clockwise spin where the bristles are curved around an axis and are extended outward by spinning in the wind as I suspect the proponents of the gay-detection-by-looking-at-the-hair-swirl are suffering by spinning their concept to fast and too long.
Posted by: oldfuzz | September 24, 2009 6:09 PM
Is this real or is the original article a satire? The methodology is not very convincing, the article is poorly written, way too many unsupported assumptions. Did this really get published? I'm only an undergrad and I can say this would be a blemish for the scientific community.
Please tell me its a joke.
Posted by: Phillip | September 25, 2009 11:31 AM
1) First of all, the author makes it apparent that none of the men who took part in the study were asked to identify themselves as 'gay' or 'straight', 'homosexual' or 'heterosexual'. They were assumed to have these identities because of behaviors they were assumed to take part in because they were on a certain beach.
2) 'Handedness' studies (with data showing that gay males are more likely to be left-handed or ambidextrous) usually conclude that a difference in brain asymmetry results physiologically in different sexual behavior (which is then assumed to mean someone is either homosexual, bisexual or heterosexual as a result of this behavior). The author of the study suggests that hair-whorl indicates the same asymmetry.
I wish to question the conclusion that one's brain asymmetry results directly in one's sexual identity by suggesting that though they they have a 'non-normative' organization of neurons, and are perhaps predisposed to 'non-normative' behaviors, these persons are not physiologically predisposed to 'non-normative' identities. Rather, they are more likely to realize that these 'normalized' identities are not innate.
Rather than assuming that homosexuality or heterosexuality as identities, or left-handedness or right-handedness are direct physiological effects of 'normal' or 'abnormal' neuron organization (as both of these things can be influenced by culture) one should realize that data like this suggests that there is no 'natural' or 'normal' sexual identity, only behaviors which have become 'normalized' by culture.
The data in this study is interesting, and (as the author acknowledges), if repeated more scientifically and with fewer assumptions, could tell us more about how the organization of our brains affects our desires.
But please, leave matters of personal identity to the individuals.
Posted by: Owen | September 25, 2009 1:02 PM
I imagine the fact that he is giving you oral sex is a bit of a giveaway as to his sexual orientation.
Posted by: Jo | September 26, 2009 7:39 AM
I imagine the fact that he is giving you oral sex is a bit of a giveaway as to his sexual orientation
You don't actually BELIEVE that do you?
Posted by: jasper doodles | October 5, 2009 9:51 PM
I always tell my wife I can tell if a guy is gay by looking at his ears. It the tops of his ears bend back close to the head I have noted a fair to good chance the man is gay. I noticed the ears on all these fashion shows on cable, the makeover kind. The flamers always seemed to have "funny" looking ears, the tops bent back more than the lower portions. My wife kids me, but guys with funny ears either are gay or just comfortably effeminate.
Posted by: Will Shirley | October 6, 2009 6:26 AM