Cracking your knuckles causes arthritis
| Cracking your knuckles causes arthritis | |
|---|---|
| FALSE | |
| "If you crack your knuckles, you will get arthritis when you grow up." | |
| Domain | Health & Medicine |
| Tactic | Fabrication |
| Era | Historical |
| First seen | 20th century |
| Origin | Parents' and grandparents' warnings |
| Last reviewed | 2026-10-30 |
| Further reading: books on Health & Medicine | |
Children who crack their knuckles are often told it will give them arthritis later in life.
Studies have found no link.
What the evidence shows
- The sound. The popping sound comes from changes in pressure in the fluid of the joint, forming a gas cavity, as shown in MRI studies.
- One-man study. Physician Donald Unger cracked the knuckles of only his left hand for about 60 years. He found no arthritis in either hand and received an Ig Nobel Prize in 2009 for the report.
- Larger studies. A 2011 study in the Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine found no association between habitual knuckle cracking and hand osteoarthritis.
Why it matters
The myth is harmless but persistent. It is a good example of how a single funny experiment and a larger study can point in the same direction.
Sources
- Kevin deWeber, Mariusz Olszewski and Rachel Ortolano, "Knuckle Cracking and Hand Osteoarthritis," Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine, 2011.
- Donald L. Unger, "Does knuckle cracking lead to arthritis of the fingers?" Arthritis & Rheumatism, 1998.
- Harvard Health Publishing, "Knuckle cracking: annoying and harmful, or just annoying?"