ABSTRACT The left hemisphere is known to be generally predominant in verbal processing and the right hemisphere in non-verbal processing. We studied whether verbal and non-verbal lateralization is present in haptics by comparing discrimination performance between letters and nonsense shapes. We addressed stimulus complexity by introducing lower case letters, which are verbally identical with upper

ABSTRACT Researchers interested in hemispheric dominance frequently aim to infer latent functional differences between the hemispheres from observed lateral behavioural or brain-activation differences. To be valid, these inferences may not only rely on the observed laterality measures but also need to account for the antecedent probabilities of the studied latent classes. This fact is frequently ignored

Research shows decreased brain region activity in the right temporo-parietal junction (rTPJ) in people with migraine headache relative to headache-free controls when performing an orienting visuospatial attention task. Functional inactivation of the rTPJ has been associated with rightward performance deviations on laterality-based attention Landmark (LM) and greyscale (GRE) tasks in individuals with

People are frequently biased to use left-side information more than right-side information to inform their perceptual judgements. This research examined whether the leftward bias also applied to preferences for the arrangement of everyday consumer items. Pairs of consumer items were created where one item was more attractive than the other item. Using a two-alternative forced choice task, Experiment

Researchers have long been interested in whether lateral preference is associated with giftedness, season of birth, and/or ADHD constructs (short attention span, high level of activity, and impulsivity). The objective of this study was to examine these associations in a large, longitudinal sample of U.S. children (National Collaborative Perinatal Project (CPP), 1959–1973). Children born to women in

In order to face a constantly changing environment, animals need to be able to update their knowledge of the world on the basis of new information. Often, this means to inhibit a previously acquired response and flexibly change their behaviour to produce a new response. Here, we measured such abilities in young domestic chicks, employing a Colour Reversal Learning Task. During the acquisition phase

Until fairly late in the nineteenth century, it was held that the brain was bilaterally symmetrical. With the discovery of left-brain dominance for language, the so-called “laws of symmetry” were revoked, and asymmetry was then seen as critical to the human condition, with the left hemisphere, in particular, assuming superordinate properties. I trace this idea from the early discoveries of the late

(2020). Obituary for Dr. Marian Annett, 1931–2018. Laterality: Vol. 25, No. 4, pp. 405-412.

Recent studies indicate that individuals with consistent hand preference are more authoritarian than individuals whose preference is relatively inconsistent. We explored the role of epistemic needs in the handedness-authoritarianism relationship. Based on findings that consistent individuals are less cognitively flexible than inconsistent individuals, we hypothesized that consistent-handers would report

(2020). Reflections of a Neuropsychologist. Laterality: Vol. 25, No. 4, pp. 511-512.

Many studies have highlighted evidence of lateralized behaviours in vertebrates and invertebrates, indicating that cerebral lateralization might not be uniquely human. Flamingos, as highly social species, might represent an interesting model in the study of lateralization, as this trait appears to be useful in gregarious animals. This study aims to investigate the presence of lateralized behaviours

(2020). Right brain psychotherapy. Laterality: Vol. 25, No. 2, pp. 255-258.

Comparative studies can help understand better brain functional lateralization for manipulation and language. This study investigated and compared, for the first time, human adults' laterality for manipulation and gestures in a non-experimental social context. We analysed the manual laterality of 48 beach volleyball athletes for four frequently expressed behaviours: a complex throwing action (jump

Pitch height is thought to be mentally represented along the vertical and the horizontal axes. This is based on a well-described effect: the Spatial Pitch Association of Response Codes (SPARC) effect. A low pitch is more easily associated with a left or a low location and a high pitch with a right or a high location. While much of the evidence supports the existence of these two "mental pitch lines"

Earlier research suggested that gaze direction has an impact on cognitive processing. It is likely that horizontal gaze direction increases activation in specific areas of the contralateral cerebral hemisphere. Consistent with the lateralization of memory functions, we previously showed that shifting gaze to the left improves visuo-spatial short-term memory. In the current study, we investigated the

Studies of brain lateralization in individuals with non-specific intellectual disability and Down syndrome suggest atypical brain lateralization to speech perception. According to the biological dissociation model, the right hemisphere (RH) mediates speech perception and the left hemisphere (LH) mediates motor control in Down syndrome. The current study aimed to test, for the first time, brain lateralization

In this study, we coded art painted on rocks located in southern Africa, which was painted with a mixture of ochre, blood, and clay by the San, a Neolithic culture with no written language. These images depict a mixture of humans and animals in a variety of contexts, including (but not limited to) hunts and dances. We calculated a laterality index for the collected available art from each region, finding

As the right hemisphere is dominant for emotion processing, the left cheek expresses emotion more intensely than the right cheek. This prompts a leftward bias: people offer the left cheek to communicate emotion and viewers perceive left cheek poses as more emotive. Perceptions of trustworthiness are positively influenced by emotional expressivity, with smiling faces deemed more trustworthy than neutral

The causes of developmental stuttering, a neurodevelopmental communicative disorder, have not been elucidated to date. Neuroimaging studies suggest that atypical cerebral laterality could be one of such causal factors. Moreover, handedness, a behavioural index for cerebral laterality, has been linked to stuttering and recovery from it. However, findings are conflicting, possibly due to sample selection

Previous studies found that valence and visual half-field have an influence on word reading: Words are processed more efficiently when they evoke positive feelings and when they appear in the right visual field. In the present study we tried to address previous (contradictory) reports of an interaction between valence and visual half-field.A group of 39 right-handed undergraduates completed a lexical

Although a population bias toward right-hand preference is observed at the early stage of grasping, hand preference fluctuates in infancy. Given these fluctuations, one can wonder whether testing a young infant on a single occasion gives reliable results of its handedness. Very few studies have evaluated short-term test-retest reliability. This was the goal of this study in which 21 infants aged 9–15

Researchers have utilized reaching paradigms to measure infant handedness for more than a century. However, methods vary widely. Recent research has identified that the number of trials used in assessment is critical with the recommendation that at least 15 trials are necessary to reliably classify infants into handedness categories via statistical cutoffs. As a first step towards establishing best

In this study, we investigated age differences in manual force production to explore their neurophysiological basis. Manual pinching and gripping forces were first measured during unilateral and bilateral efforts in two groups of right-handed adults (young, n = 12, senior, n = 11). Then, transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) was applied to each hemisphere to assess central motor inhibition via the

Brain–computer interfaces (BCI) decode user’s intentions to control external devices. However, performance variations across individuals have limited their use to laboratory environments. Handedness could contribute to these variations, especially when motor imagery (MI) tasks are used for BCI control. To further understand how handedness affects BCI control, performance differences between two monozygotic

Age-related changes have been identified in neural and motor level. A prominent change is reduced asymmetry in cortical activation as well as motor performance. Cortical activation models have been established based on cognitive research utilizing neuroimaging techniques to explain age-related effects on neural recruitment and reduced brain asymmetry. Recently, researchers in motor behaviour attempted

The unilateral contractions procedure (i.e., squeezing a ball with one hand) supposedly enhances a wide variety of cognitive functions, from episodic recall to choking under pressure. The practicality and affordability of this procedure makes it highly appealing. But does it work? We addressed this question by testing whether intermittent and sustained unilateral contractions shifted a well-supported

(2020). Dyslexia and neuroscience: the geschwind-galaburda hypothesis 30 years later. Laterality: Vol. 25, No. 3, pp. 390-392.

In human social interaction, affective touch plays an integral role to communicate intentions and emotions. Three of the most important forms of social touch are embracing, cradling and kissing. These behaviours have been demonstrated to be lateralized, but the underlying mechanisms are still not well understood. Both motor and emotive biases have been suggested to affect laterality of social touch

Based on numerous findings of an abnormal laterality in schizophrenia disorder, we hypothesized that handedness and lateral preferences may affect the age at onset in schizophrenia patients. Two samples of schizophrenia patients, the first a sample of 34 right-handers and 42 left-handers and a replication set of 84 right-handers, were examined with regard to age at onset considering handedness and

Studies have found a tendency for heads in portraits to be oriented so that more of the left side than the right side of the face is visible, though it is stronger in female than in male portraits. Two studies are reported that set head orientation in the context of body and gaze orientation, and additionally look at effects of artistic medium (paintings, photographs, and drawings) and changes in the

Several non-verbal perceptual and attentional processes have been linked with specialization of the right cerebral hemisphere. Given that most people have a left hemispheric specialization for language, it is tempting to assume that functions of these two classes of dominance are related. Unfortunately, such models of complementarity are notoriously hard to test. Here we suggest a method which compares

A remarkable feature of human handedness at the population level is specialization of the hands, the right hand performing usually better than the left. This specialization might have an evolutionary advantage, because it provides the individual and population with a wider range of skill. We therefore investigated the relationships between hand skill asymmetry and potential markers of Darwinian fitness

Although olfactory laterality in canids has been demonstrated experimentally, the extent to which nostril bias occurs in "nature" is not well known. We tested whether there was olfactory laterality of untrained dogs in various off-leash dog parks within Victoria, British Columbia to manipulated scents placed at the tail base of full-size dog replica. Using video-playback, we found that of 192 separate

Handedness ontogenesis is still under debate in science. This systematic review analyzed articles regarding the theories and basis of handedness formation, highlighting the historical knowledge path that this literature underwent. Cochrane Library, LILACS, Web of Sciences, Science Direct and PubMed databases were searched. This review included review studies with handedness as the main topic. Only

Left and inconsistent hand preferences are the markers of atypical brain organization that relate with cognitive and behavioural traits as well as with developmental disorders, whereas intolerance of uncertainty is the trait of inability to bear future uncertainty that mediates anxiety disorders and depression. In the present study, relationship of hand preference with intolerance of uncertainty was

This project was undertaken to describe percentage differences in the grip strength between the dominant and nondominant-sides of left- and right-handed males and females across the age span. Data used in the project were from population-based samples of participants: 13,653 from the 2011-2014 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) and 3,571 from the 2011 normative phase of the National

Liaison between neuroscience and education has resulted in significant advances in our understanding of the neurobiological learning requirements of individuals with reading disability, the neuroplasticity of the developing brain, and the participation of the right hemisphere in reading. Research in neural network theory and cortical oscillations suggests that the hemispheres collaborate in high-level

Dichotic listening is a well-established method to non-invasively assess hemispheric specialization for processing of speech and other auditory stimuli. However, almost six decades of research also have revealed a series of experimental variables with systematic modulatory effects on task performance. These variables are a source of systematic error variance in the data and, when uncontrolled, affect

Cheater detection, which is a prerequisite for the evolution of social cooperation, has been successfully simulated in laboratory settings. However, the process has not been perfect because the detection rate has usually been just above chance. The present study investigated the role of lateral posing biases and emotional expressions in displaying trustworthiness, which plays a crucial role in cheater

Predator-prey relationships have been suggested to be one of the primary evolutionary factors driving the development of functional hemispheric asymmetries. However, lateralization in many predator species is not well understood and existing studies often are statistically underpowered due to small sample sizes and they moreover show conflicting results. Here, we statistically integrated findings on

People exhibit consistent leftward spatial biases across a variety of tasks. However, individuals with a native reading direction other than left-to-right (LTR) show an attenuation of the leftward bias. The current study used procedurally similar tasks to examine spatial ability and aesthetic preferences in LTR and right-to-left (RTL) groups. In the spatial task participants viewed a centred rectangle

Adult participants from India and France were requested to respond to hand and foot preference questionnaires. The items of the questionnaires assessed the choice of the preferred hand and foot on a scale that ranged from extreme left preference through no preference to extreme right preference. Results showed that both groups were more right lateralized for hand actions, whereas foot preferences were

Spatial biases in graphomotor production tasks such as figure drawing may reflect biological (cerebral lateralization), biomechanical (limb movement), and/or cultural (reading/writing direction) influences. The present study examined sources of bias in the placement in graphic space of a symmetrical drawn figure (a tree). A previous study using a child sample found an overall leftward placement bias

This study aims to determine whether breastfeeding duration affects the prevalence of nonrighthandedness in later life. A systematic search for studies on this topic was completed in 2018, and risk of bias was assessed by means of the Newcastle-Ottawa scale. Seven national surveys in five countries with Individual Participant Data (IPD) were identified (n = 62,129 mother-child dyads). These surveys

In social media's attention economy "likes" are currency; photos showing faces attract more "likes." Previous research has established a left cheek bias in photos uploaded to social media, but whether left cheek poses induce more engagement than right cheek poses remains to be determined. The present study thus examined whether pose orientation influences the number of "likes" and comments garnered

The purpose of the current study was to determine if the relationship between interhemispheric interaction and cognitive flexibility extends to explanations of forgiveness and apology acceptance. A growing body of research indicates that consistency of handedness may be reflective of an individual's degree of interhemispheric interaction and access to processes of the right hemisphere. As such, individual

Hand preference is commonly measured via self-report using instruments known as handedness inventories. These instruments query which hand subjects use to perform unimanual object-based tasks and also the consistency of usage. Scores reveal which hand people report using most (i.e., which hand is preferred). Some people report highly consistent usage of their preferred hand while others report relatively

There is evidence for a tendency for European portrait paintings to have the head oriented so that the left side of the face is visible more than the right side. This is particularly the case for female sitters. There is evidence that the left side of the face shows emotion more than the right side does, so it has been proposed that there is a tendency for artists or sitters to want to show more of

Structural lateralization of cortical language areas has been extensively studied in the past, with the conclusion that there is a predominant left lateralization in the majority of typically developing adolescents. However, lateralization in this age group has often been examined using cortical volumetric measures, without taking into account the independence of surface area and thickness. Utilizing

While handedness questionnaires are widely used in adults, there is no comparable measure designed specifically for children. The current study developed the Home Handedness Questionnaire (HHQ), a new measure for preschoolers administered by parents using common household items. The HHQ has two scales that distinguish action types typically combined on other measures: actions performed with only the

Frontal alpha EEG asymmetry, an indirect marker of asymmetries in relative frontal brain activity, are widely used in research on lateralization of emotional processing. While most authors focus on frontal electrode pairs (e.g., F3/F4 or F7/F8), several recent studies have indicated that EEG asymmetries can also be observed outside the frontal lobe and in frequency bands other than alpha. Because the

Previous studies have argued that a person's ability to write legibly with the non-dominant hand after a limited amount of practice suggests that manual skill can be easily transferred. The present study investigated the degree to which handedness can be altered by short-term practice on the highly complex manual activity of handwriting. Nine strongly right-handed individuals practiced writing with

Previous studies on adults with dyslexia (DYS) have indicated difficulties in the comprehension of figurative language. Using the divided visual field paradigm, the present study investigated the hemispheric processing of idioms among 22 adults with DYS and 21 regular reader (RR) adults. Participants performed a lexical decision task for a target word related to either a literal or a figurative interpretation

The original approach of the Hemispheric Encoding/Retrieval Asymmetry model (HERA) was aimed at the operations of encoding and retrieving episodic memories. However, whether HERA presumptions can apply to different types of stimuli (e.g., words and pictures) continues to be a matter of debate. Therefore, in order to analyse the effects of brain pre-activation on subsequent memory, HERA was tested through

In a classical dichotic listening paradigm, besides auditory brain asymmetry, cognitive functions such as attention and conflict resolution play a major role. The aim of this study is to reveal the possible haemodynamic mechanisms of higher attentional performance in prefrontal cortex during dichotic listening test. Twenty-six healthy participants underwent a dichotic listening task in three sessions;

According to the body-specificity hypothesis, left-handers (right-handers) are more likely to associate positive attributes with the left (right) side. We tested whether such body-specific influences also apply to evaluative judgments in realistic dynamic scenes. In two experiments (order counterbalanced), N = 231 participants watched videos from dual mogul competition where two skiers turn downhill

The current study investigated the role of interhemispheric communication in selective exposure to information. Participants (N = 241) reported their attitude and attitude strength toward a controversial social topic, engaged in a selective exposure task, and completed the Poffenberger paradigm. As expected, participants demonstrated a moderate (d = 0.50) preference for attitude consistent information