[The difference between the mineral content and the width of the radius on each side and its significance for handedness determination of skeletal material].

Abstract

The objective of our work was to investigate whether the side-different use of the upper extremities due to handedness produces detectable differences in bone-mineral content (BMC) and bone width (BW). For this purpose 251 recent individuals whose handedness was established, were examined by means of the 125I-photon-absorption technique. Highly significant right-left differences in BMC and BW were found on the midshaft and distal radius. Discrimination functions based on BMC and BW were carried out, allowing for the classification into the appropriate handedness categories. Applying the same method we tried to diagnose the handedness of the skeletal material of 40 medieval and 27 neolithic individuals.