Shaking hands ‘will come back’ after Covid-19

Will we ever shake hands again? Since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, some have suggested the age of the handshake is over forever. But one scientist thinks shaking hands is in our DNA. This time last year, Covid-19 had only just reached the Western world. But already amongst its very first casualties was an ancient institution, respected across the planet: the handshake. Now a new book by palaeoanthropologist Ella Al-Shamahi argues that the handshake is not yet dead. Rather, she writes in The Handshake: A Gripping History, it is “in temporary lockdown, social-distancing, quarantining but, like most of us, going nowhere.” Previously, most anthropologists believed that handshakes were born in the Middle East and Europe and spread around the world in the 19th Century by European missionaries. But Al-Shamahi believes that shaking hands is a universal custom – one embedded in our very DNA and going back thousands, perhaps millions, of years. Handshakes are recorded in very early human civilisations: characters in the Iliad shake hands before doing battle. Ancient Romans shook hands at weddings. And uncontacted peoples in New Guinea, when they first met Europeans, seemed to understand instinctively what their visitors meant when they stretched out their hands. They even seem to appear in our close non-human relatives. Chimpanzees and bonobos will make up after a fight by touching each other’s fingers and palms. For Al-Shamahi, all of this suggests that handshakes are not learnt behaviours: they are innate. So why would human beings have evolved the handshake? Some think the answer is chemical. Like animals, human beings can detect scents from each other, and these act as a kind of chemical warning system. Shaking hands lets us get close enough to tell if another person feels fear or anger towards us. Studies have shown that it is common for humans to sniff their hands after shaking, allowing them to analyse the scents the other person has left behind. Of course, not every culture does shake hands. In Japan, it is traditional to bow when meeting someone – a custom that some people have credited for the country’s low infection rates of Covid-19. Under Islamic law, it is recommended that men shake hands with each other, but men and women must not shake hands. In India and parts of South East Asia, the Namaste gesture is the usual way of greeting someone. In France and Egypt, people kiss each other on the cheeks as well as shaking hands: these kisses are known as “bises”. Al-Shamahi thinks that this is because these cultures have evolved out of shaking hands – in the same way that despite humans evolving to eat meat, some cultures have developed a fully vegetarian diet. And it could be that western countries are starting to go the same way. Even before the pandemic, the handshake was already in decline. In the 20th Century, people of all ages in the Western world would naturally shake hands when first meeting each other. But today, young people are much less likely to shake hands with people their own age, preferring a fist bump, a hug or even just a nod. Will we ever shake hands again? Shaken not stirred Yes, say some. Shaking hands, along with other forms of physical contact, are essential to humanity. We use handshakes to establish a bond with other people, show our trust in them and our goodwill towards them, or to size them up as an opponent. This complex social custom is burnt so deeply into our relationships with other people that nothing can replace it. Not at all, say others. The handshake was already on its way out and the pandemic has simply hurried along the process. For many young people, handshakes seem much too formal – even unnatural and awkward. Health concerns have simply provided yet another reason to do away with a habit that had outlived its usefulness. New means of social interaction will evolve in its place. KeywordsInnate - Present naturally.