More specifically Orme (1970) found that left-handers reported themselves to be more introvert and shy than right-handers, Hicks and Pellegrini (1978) reported that left- and mixed-handers were significantly more anxious and Davidson and Schaffer (1983) reported higher trait anxiety levels in left-handers.
Thus the current study investigated state and trait anxiety levels in an experimental situation. We found left-handers had significantly higher state scores, supporting the right hemisphere's role in negative affect and inhibition.
Myth: Lefties are introverted
Another common lore is that left-handed people tend to be more introverted than righties. But a 2013 New Zealand study found no differences across any of the five personality measures tested between right-handers and left-handers.
According to a small study published in the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, lefties are more prone to having negative emotions. In addition, they seem to have a more difficult time processing their feelings. Again, this seems to be related to the brain-hand connection.
Only about 10% of the population is left-handed, yet lefties make up as much as 40% of cases of psychotic disorders. The brains of left-handers are organized slightly differently than the brains of right-handers, due to genetic differences or environmental stressors during brain development.
Overall, individuals with ADHD had a 27.3 percent chance of being either left-handed or mixed-handed compared to 18.1 percent in the general population. So the results suggest that the effects are smaller than for the autism spectrum, but generally go in the same direction.
Left-handed and ambidextrous people are more susceptible to negative emotions, including anger. A small study published last year in the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease found that the brains of lefties process emotions differently than those of righties, with more communication between the brain's two halves.
In a study from 1975 on 7,688 children in US grades 1-6, left handers comprised 9.6% of the sample, with 10.5% of male children and 8.7% of female children being left-handed. Handedness is often defined by one's writing hand, as it is fairly common for people to prefer to do a particular task with a particular hand.
Since they use their right hemisphere of the brain more prominently, this makes left-handed people more analytical, creative, and verbal, and showcase better language skills. Left-handed people also have great leadership skills. Left-handed people also make good artists, creators, and sportspersons.
While this is still contested, studies have found that artists like painters, musicians and even architects are mostly left-handers. Right and left-handed people deal with tasks and memory in different ways. Left-handers are known to efficiently multitask as they look at the tasks as a whole.
They're better at sports and fighting - Lefties can swing mean left hooks and can adapt quickly to unexpected situations in sports. They're not necessarily right-brained - It's a common myth that lefties are right-brained and more creative and artistic than righties.
Lefties--or at least relatives of lefties--may be better than right-handed people at remembering events, according to a new study. Since the mid-1980s, scientists have known that the two brain hemispheres of left-handers are more strongly connected than those of right-handers.
Abrams, which adeptly breaks down a mathematical explanation for why the rate of left-handed people has remained steady—about 10% of the population—for the last 500,000 years. The reason boils down to two words, “competition” and “cooperation,” and how the balance between those forces plays out in human societies.
Links between left-handedness and dyslexia, ADHD and some mood disorders have also been reported in research studies. The reasons for this aren't clear. Scientists speculate it could be related to a concept known as brain lateralization. The brain has two halves.
It is found that, using three different measures, left-handers are significantly more likely to have depressive symptoms that right-handers. For example left-handers are about 5% more likely to have reported having ever experienced symptoms of depression compared to about 27% of the total sample.
Why? A lefty's curveball can be a nasty pitch against right-handers, but it can also throw lefties off too. The curve can head straight for the batter then break at the last second, causing the hitter to instinctively back off. Left-handed hitters can have a particularly hard time with lefty pitchers throwing sidearm.
Handedness represents one form of functional hemispheric asymmetries—e.g., left-right differences in the brain. Specifically, in left-handers, the motor cortex in the right side of the brain (the left side of the body is controlled by the right side of the brain, and vice versa) is dominant for fine motor behavior.
In left-handed individuals, the left and right brain hemispheres showed more robust activity in those regions associated with increased language skills. Further, lefties may be more sensitive folks overall, The Guardian writes.
Left-handed people have right brain dominance for body control, which may also result in the more artistic personality for which such people are known. However, as can be seen, by the fact that there are numerous right-handed artists as well as left-handed rational thinkers, brain lateralization only goes so far.
Left Handedness in Research
In a study controlled for average intelligence (IQ), sex, and age, roughly 62% of those on the autism spectrum were not right-handed (i.e., they were more likely to be either left-handed, mix-handed, or of unclear handedness) compared to only 37% of the control sample population.
When they are using just a spoon, 95% use it in their LEFT hand for that as well, so we continue FEEDING ourselves with our dominant left hand. When left-handers are using just a knife, e.g. for cutting bread, 88% move it into their left hand.
In fact, the difference is 90:10. This means that dyslexia may be more commonly found in left-handed people but the relationship is not necessarily causal.