Get a grip

Published in Business Week in the Dec 3, 2007 issue. Article by Catherine Arnst

"Get a Grip"

Sizing up the new guy at work? Check out his handshake. The firmer it is, the more socially dominant he's likely to be, concludes a small study led by psychologist Gordon Gallup of the State University of New York at Albany. The study, which analyzed the handshakes - and the sexual, social and physical histories - of 140 college students, found no correlation for females between a strong grip and behavioral competitiveness or body type. (As with men, there was a link to good health.) But males with firm grips reported more aggressive behavior and were more likley to have broad shoulders and narrow hips. (There were also about 10% more promiscouos.) Gallup says a grip's strength is 35% environmental, 65% genetic - and that a strong claps may have evolved from human's deep past, when tree-swinging monkeys with weak grips fell to earth more often.