The Left Braint and the Right Hand
Michael points to the fact that many people associate left-handedness with superior intelligence. However, he continues to add that the allegations are largely mythical and fabricated without proof. Michaels asserts that left-handedness or right-handedness depends on the dominant brain hemisphere. For left-handed people, the right brain hemisphere is more dominant, for the right-handed people, the left hemisphere is more dominant.
In cases where the brain’s hemispheres are symmetrical, the individual tends to be ambidextrous, an observation common among left-handed people. Research into brain functioning has gone on to discover that brain hemisphere symmetry reduces localization of functions, and can result in either dysfunctions or unusually creative thinking processes, Einstein had had such a brain. About 90% of people are right-handed; the remainder is either left-handed or ambiextrous. On another level, men tend to be more left-handed than women are a 2-percentage point for women for every 12% of men. Importance of the articleThe article tries to unravel the myths behind left-handedness and its relation to thinking capacities and influencing factors.
Major concepts Left-handedness is attributed to genetic history of the individual’s family. The gene presumed for left-handedness, LRRTM1, is also associated with schizophrenia. In addition, brains with lower localization of activities have a link to lower IQ scores, but ambidextrous people had slightly lower scores in arithmetic, memory, and reasoning. Left-handed people also have a rare ability called magical ideation, the ability to tell whether a person is talking directly to them or talking about them. Concerning left-handedness and gender, scientists have observed that cultural roles tend to affect largely the extent of left-handedness in a society.
Author’s conclusionsThe results on left-handedness, which shows a brains likeliness to use both hemispheres to process information may cause brain anomalies in addition to high possibilities of lower IQ scores, schizophrenia, and magical ideation. Women are less prone to left-handedness, and culture appears to have a role in the ratio of left-handed population in a society. Also, left handed brains have more open thinking abilities, with studies suggesting that left-handed people might think more creatively than right-handed people, a phenomenon which is exhibited in the money they can make from jobs requiring critical thinking.
