Left-Handedness Stumps Science

http://news.yahoo.com/left-handedness-stumps-science-205805054.html

by daegloe • 13 years ago

6 8 13 years ago

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Although it is not uncommon, I've never come across a decent explanation for my "deviation". Left-hand: writing, drawing, painting. Right hand: mouse, touchpad, throwing, hammering. I can't use both hands equally, it's very specific to what I'm doing. I play soccer with the right foot. Also, I cannot tell left from right without first pausing to think "left is the side with the wristwatch".

daegloe• 13 years ago

Over the years, I've noticed that many left-handed people in my life (including my wife, family members, friends, co-workers, etc) have difficulty telling left from right. In fact, I recently had a conversation about this with two left-handed colleagues, and they both acknowledged the issue.

Is there really something to this? Is it environmental (growing up in a right-handed world)? Anyone have additional insight?

ap3• 13 years ago

similar here: throw, kick, bat right handed. Eat, write, tennis racquet left handed. And I have to think about what side my left hand is on before I give left-right directions to others.

Leftium• 13 years ago

Similar situation here; my working theory is that I have dominant left wrist/fingers for tasks that require fine motor skills (writing, drawing, painting) and dominant right arm for tasks that require more arm strength (throwing).

Of course, there seem to be some exceptions. I hammer with the left hand (needs more precision than strength?) and mouse with the right (too cumbersome to switch default setup?). Racket sports generally confuse me, but I tend to end up using my right arm.

I find it interesting you wear your watch on the left wrist; I naturally wear it on my right.

On a related note, have you ever noticed many people switch their fork-hand when eating with a knife? Right handers prefer both the fork and knife in their right hand, so they must temporarily put the fork in their left. I just keep the fork in my left hand and use the knife with my right.

gliese1337• 13 years ago

I'm a righty and my wife is a lefty; I always keep my fork in my right hand and knife in my left, and do not switch them, so we're symmetrical at the dinner table. If she's not around, I will sometimes use fork-in-left, knife-in-right, but I don't switch back and forth while eating.

I attribute that variability to the fact that I also usually have to actually try to do something, or at least imagine doing it, to keep track of which side is left and which side is right. When eating with my wife, I end up being consistent in which utensils I pick up with which hands because she provides the cue for me to mirror.

There are lots of physical skills in which I'm reasonably equally proficient with both hands just due to extensive practice (typing, throwing a frisbee, spinning staffs), but I'm much better at left-handed contact juggling. It's sort of explainable because I can practice left-handed contact juggling while doing other stuff with my dominant hand, but odd because skills that I learn first with my left hand usually transfer very quickly to my right.

serverascode• 13 years ago

I'm a lefty and never have a problem knowing which is which.

jjhooper• 13 years ago

I seem to have gone right-handed if it involves two hands or feet, but left-handed if it's only one. So I'm left-handed for tennis, but right-handed for baseball/cricket. I write left-handed, but with knife & fork I just go with the right-handed norm. A social adaptation I suppose.

leephillips• 13 years ago

This is a well-known type of handedness (people are not simply right- or left-handed). When I began guitar lessons my teacher informed me that, although I wrote with my left hand, since I threw a ball with my right I would need a right-handed guitar.

Left-Handedness Stumps Science

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