According to the famous "marshmallow test" — in which children are given a marshmallow and then told they must wait to eat it — there is perhaps no trait that better predicts future success than self-control. Kids who can control their impulses and delay gratification do better in school and in their future careers. Good news for lefties: Left-handed people have better "inhibitory control," helping them do just that, according to the JECN study.
Another key finding from the JECN study was that lefties have a better working memory than righties. The working memory is the part of your brain that juggles short-term and on-going tasks, giving left-handed kids an edge at school and at video games. Secret handshakes are always cool, but if it's two right-handed kids then you're limited to the same moves. Throw in a leftie and they can mirror each other which everyone knows looks way cooler.
Sports like gymnastics, baseball, tennis, basketball and pole vaulting change significantly depending on which hand is the dominant one. Aside from style differences, this may give some practical advantages to left-handed athletes. For example, the same tumbling move done with a different hand placement may look novel, attracting more attention from judges, or a left-handed batter may throw off a pitcher's spatial perception by standing on the opposite side of the base.
The advantage is particularly strong in tennis and baseball, according to a study done by Penn State. Left-handed scissors are a rare find, but they're worth every penny for the added comfort and dexterity they offer.
So while all the other kids in kindergarten have to fight over the box of communal scissors, your child will have their pair all to themselves. A kid with a competitive edge can go a long way in this dog-eat-dog world, and lefties are more likely to be competitive than cooperative, according to a Northwestern study. Chalk it up to evolution: The more importance cooperation is to a society, the more likely the society is to exhibit same-handedness.
Being an anomoly doesn't mean your child will be mean , but rather that they may be willing to buck societal norms to accomplish their dreams. Lefties eat with their opposite elbow out, which often leaves dining companions to choose between getting elbowed periodically through the meal or simply letting the left-handed kid have the left edge seat. Most people learn pretty quickly it's better for everyone's digestion if you just let them have their pick of the chairs first.
Learning to write is tricky enough, but for the ten percent of children who write left-handed, it can be even harder—not the writing itself, but the fact that the lessons are usually done by right-handed teachers. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, as it means lefties may get more one-on-one instruction. If you're a twin or a parent of a twin, you know that being a twin is awesome for many reasons — for starters, you have built-in best friend, confidante ,and clothing-sharer. As our world is designed mainly for righties, left-handed people have become quite deft in doing certain things with their right hands.
Lefties have a pretty negative reputation in cultural history worldwide. Lefties were often seen as weak, unlucky, corrupt, and sometimes even associated with evil. During the Middle Ages, the left-handed were often suspected of witchcraft and accused of being in league with the devil. Children born with a natural preference towards their left sides were forced to eat and write with their right hands.
Although this stopped in the 20th century, it continues in some parts of the world. Not everyone in the world saw lefties as unfavorable.
Amongst the Incas, left-handed people were seen in a favorable light. Those who were lefties were believed to have spiritual abilities, including the power to heal. Lloque Yupanqui, the third Sapa Inca, was known for being a leftie. Researchers who study wild chimpanzees had noted that they are more likely to favor their left hands while performing skills that require fine motor coordination, such as termite fishing.
However, the chimps would prefer their right hand when performing tasks that required brute force, such as nut-cracking. Even Neanderthals were discovered to have favored their right hands — this means that they often built any stone tools they had for righties.
Left-handed Neanderthals had to either learn to use them or make special tools that they could use. This was determined after studying the tools and bones in the arms of neanderthal skeletons through skeletal asymmetry. A fetus starts to move its arms in the womb at around the nine to the ten-week mark.
By the time the pregnancy reaches the second trimester , babies already show a preference on which thumb they would rather suck on, the right or left. This makes some believe that handedness is something that is determined before birth. However, children have also been seen to switch their dominant hands until the age of two years, sometimes three, so it is never guaranteed that a child will be left-handed or right-handed based on their actions in the womb.
Despite most of the world overcoming the stigma surrounding left-handedness, in countries like Pakistan, India, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Nepal, and the Middle East, it is still considered rude to give something to someone with your left hand. It is also considered rude if you pick things up or eat with your left hand. King George VI was also left-handed but forced his father to learn to use his right hand. People view lefties as unfavorable, but it is seen in some ways through language as well.
A study has found that left-handed people are better drivers than righties. They found that lefties are involved in far fewer accidents than righties. An AA Driving School conducted a poll and found that while 47 righties passed their driving test the first time, 57 lefties passed on the first try. By the time the human race started drawing in caves, most were already showing signs of right-handedness. This can be seen as the cave paintings depict the human figures always carrying tools in their right hands.
The images of handprints are also mostly done with the right hand. Numerous studies have been done on handedness in twins, and almost all of them have shown that twins are far more likely to be left-handed than singletons. Vegetable peelers only have one sharp side. They're designed so that when they're held in the right hand, the sharp side is on top and users can comfortably pull the tool toward themselves in a smooth, gentle motion, as seen in the photo above.
But when the peeler is held in the left hand, the sharp side of the blade is on the bottom. This means lefties have to push the peeler away from themselves, resulting in short, jerky, uncomfortable peeling motions.
Luckily, lefties can purchase left-handed peelers that solve the problem. The natural way to open a door is to reach across your body to grab the knob, and the default is usually to have the knob on the left-hand side. That means they're often built for righties to reach across their bodies with their dominant hand. Now, imagine reaching for a knob on the left side of the door with your left hand and pulling.
Basically, you end up with the door in your face. There's a bright side, though, because lefties get the advantage when they go through that same doorway from the other direction.
On the other side of the door, the knob will be on the right, so it's meant to be grabbed with the left. On left-handed rulers , the numbers move from right to left instead. That way, lefties can drag their pens from right to left and get a clear look at the numbers. There's a left-handed tape measure you can buy to fix this problem, too. World globe An icon of the world globe, indicating different international options.
Get the Insider App. Click here to learn more. A leading-edge research firm focused on digital transformation.
Caroline Praderio and Talia Lakritz.
0コメント