Thumbs Are the New Fingers for GameBoy Youth

An anonymous reader writes "Reuters is running an interesting story on how the use of gadgets such as mobile phones and GameBoys has caused a physical mutation in young people's hands. The use of the thumb is a deviation from the use of the index finger..."

Comments

Hmm, I have mutated too?

[Wizard of OS]

In her research, Plant noticed that while those less used to mobile phones used one or several fingers to access the keypad, younger people used both thumbs ambidextrously, barely looking at the keys as they made rapid entries.

If I play a musical instrument then I don't look at my fingers anymore (either when playing the piano or guitar), does that mean that I have mutated in a musick playing monster? ;-)

I think the author mixed 'learning' with 'mutating'

Re:This questions the old ideas about evolution

[shyster]

Evolution (as in "altering of physical form of whole populations of individuals due to external factors") seems much more likely to happen over a few generations. The "old school" is teaching us that evolution is happening only on course of hundeds or thousands of generations. This may not be the case actually.

It's not evolution! It's common sense! Use your thumbs more, and they'll become stonger, more flexible, and more dexterous. Not evolution, muscles.

Natural result of changing interfaces

[Reziac]

Ignoring the nonsensical use of "mutation"... I've noticed that little kids use their thumbs like adults use their forefingers. But the current crop of kids are the first generation that grew up with buttons on EVERYTHING, and were introduced to it right out of the crib. How many kids nowadays have ever seen a rotary dial telephone?

I think it's the natural effect of a transition from gadgets where the forefinger or a thumb-and-fingers grip was the reasonable choice (such as rotary phone dials and rotary controls on TVs, stoves, etc) to gadgets that are button-driven, so any digit will do the job.

If you watch toddlers, you'll notice they try to press buttons with their thumbs far more often than they try to press them with an index finger. To a toddler, everything is for gripping (not for poking) so the gripping member (the thumb) is the natural choice.

If you grow up with buttons on every gadget in the house, it's likely that you'll continue to use your thumb, rather than getting retrained to use an index finger (as getting your thumb damnear ripped off by a phone's rotary dial will enforce in a hurry).

This is no different from the sort of retraining that happens with any interface transition. It just happens to coincide with a physical action that comes more naturally to little kids, hence is easy to continue doing as they grow up.