15 Surprising Facts About Left-Handed People (2023)

FAQs

What is an interesting fact about left-handed people? ›

A few studies have shown that left-handed people are more likely to have an IQ of 131 or higher. Coincidentally, Isaac Newton, Benjamin Franklin and Albert Einstein were all lefties.

By The Numbers

12% – the percentage of the world that is left-handed.

Since left-handed people are right-brain dominant, it enables them to creative and intuitive. They have high levels of imagination. 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.

Being left-handed also has its perks, including: Left-handed people are at an advantage in a wide range of sports, from fencing to boxing. The sporting advantage also includes taking the right-handed opponent by surprise, because right-handed athletes aren't used to playing against left-handed opponents.

In fact, one of the more unusual hypotheses to explain the rarity of left-handedness is that a genetic mutation in our distant past caused the language centres of the human brain to shift to the left hemisphere, effectively causing right-handedness to dominate, Alasdair Wilkins explains for io9 back in 2011.

About 10 percent of the population is left-handed. The rest are right-handed, and there are also about 1 percent who are ambidextrous, which means they have no dominant hand. Not only are lefties outnumbered about 9 to 1 by righties, there are health risks that appear to be greater for left handers, too.

In their analysis of 144 handedness and brain laterality studies—accounting for a total of nearly 1.8 million individuals—University of Oxford psychologists Marietta Papadatou-Pastou, PhD, and Maryanne Martin, PhD, found that males are about 2 percent more likely to be left-handed than females.

Left-handedness occurs in about 8% of the human population. It runs in families and an adoption study suggests a genetic rather than an environmental origin; however, monozygotic twins show substantial discordance.

In fact, McManus writes, “The highest rates of left-handedness are in the north-east, in Maine, Vermont, Massachusetts, and Connecticut, whereas the lowest rates are in the mid-West, in Wyoming and North Dakota.”

INTERNATIONAL LEFT HANDERS DAY | AUGUST 11

International Left Handers Day on August 13th recognizes all those individuals who have mastered using their left hand in a right-handed world.

Which country has most left handers? ›

McManus which found that the Netherlands has one of the world's highest prevalences of left-handedness at 13.23 percent. The United States isn't far behind with a rate of 13.1 percent while neighboring Canada has 12.8 percent. Elsewhere, rates of left-handedness are far lower and China is a good example.

Our confidence intervals at a 95% confidence level show that the average IQ for a left handed person is between 117.73 and 127.19 and for a right handed person it is between 109.9 and 123.5.

Take a look at their work desk. You should be able to spot the daily items such as notepad, pens, hole puncher and stapler, on his/her desk. A true blue lefty will definitely have these items set on the left side of the table for easy access.

Special or not, lefties are born, not made: Genetics are at least partially responsible for handedness. Up until last year, it was assumed that hand preference comes from asymmetrical genes in the brain—two hands, two brain hemispheres, one is dominant.

For example, left handedness determined by grip strength has been shown to be associated with poorer cognitive function [12], whereas left handedness, via self-report, has been shown to be associated with better memory and attention task performance [13].

First Chronicles 12:2 seems to reference bowmen who were ambidextrous. When the Bible refers to left-handed people, it speaks of left-handedness as an advantage, not a weakness. While it is not as honorable as sitting at someone's right hand, sitting at the left hand is still a position of honor.

Left-handedness was associated with differences in brain asymmetry in areas related to working memory, language, hand control and vision. Some of these brain areas were linked to specific genes. Scientists have long been fascinated by left-handedness.

-Counting how many people are left-handed is more difficult than it looks, because of variations in preference and skill from task to task and because of left-handers having been forced to write with their right hand, but the best estimate we have is that roughly 10% of the world population is left-handed.

Left-handedness — sometimes called "sinistrality" — means you prefer to use your left hand rather than your right hand for routine activities, such as writing. Most people who have studied left-handedness believe that approximately 10 percent of the people in the world are left-handed.

What are the disadvantages of being left-handed? ›

On the flip side, lefties have some disadvantages too.

Some studies show that left-handed people showed an imbalance in processing emotions with their left and right hemispheres of their brain. Left-handed people have a higher risk of brain disorders like schizophrenia, dyslexia or hyperactivity disorders.

They observed that overall, children had a chance of 9.7 percent of being left-handed. However, parental handedness strongly influenced the chance of a child being left-handed. If both mother and father were right-handed, the chance of their offspring being left-handed was only 7 percent.

If two parents are right-handed, their offspring has a 10% chance of being left-handed. However, if one or both parents are left-handed, the chance of their child being left-handed becomes higher at 18 to 22% and 27%, respectively.

5 But most left-handed people do not have any associated learning disabilities. Keep in mind that these findings are a matter of ongoing debate among scientists, due to differences in how hand preference and learning skills are measured.

It is estimated that right handed people amount to roughly 87% of the world. Left Handed (~12%). The second most common handedness type, studies show that on average us lefties make up around 12% of the population.

The proportion of left-handers increased almost linearly with year of birth up to 1970, i.e. the birth year of the youngest participants, with ~ 0.7 percentage-points per decade (Fig.

About 10 per cent of the population is left-handed, and while being a leftie doesn't prevent you from having beautiful handwriting, it's recognised that learning to write can be a more difficult process for left-handed children.

The Royal Family's Handedness

Texts indicate that Queen Elizabeth II is right-handed, and some of her relatives, such as her great-grandmother Queen Victoria, her dad King George VI, her mum the Queen Mum, and her grandson, William, are left-handed.

Research shows left-handed people may have a lower risk of developing ulcers and arthritis. They may also recover more quickly from strokes. An older article in the American Journal of Psychology suggests that left-handed people may be better at divergent thinking, a thought process used to generate creative ideas.

What percentage of females are left-handed? ›

This indicates that if females had a chance of being left-handed of exactly 10 percent, males would have a 12 percent chance (the exact percentages vary a bit depending on geographical region). Given the low incidence of left-handedness in general, this 2 percent increase is quite a substantial difference.

When you sign your name, odds are good that you will do so with your right hand. Only about 10 percent of people worldwide are left-handed, experts say. They're more comfortable writing, throwing a ball and doing other manual tasks with their left hand.

However, post-hoc exploration of their and other sets of data has shown that there is an apparent tendency for left-handedness to be more prevalent in the period March-July than in the period August-February.

Lefties make up only about 10 percent of the population, but studies find that individuals who are left-handed score higher when it comes to creativity, imagination, daydreaming and intuition. They're also better at rhythm and visualization.

Left-handers – we know from our own surveys that 74% of left-handers eat with a knife and fork in the “right-handed” way – with the fork in their left hand and feeding themselves with the left hand.

Retired bats Barry Bonds and Ken Griffey Jr. are also southpaws, as are some of the game's greatest pitchers including Randy Johnson, Steve Carlton, Ron Guidry, and Whitey Ford.

Left-handedness has been discouraged as recently as the mid-20th century. At times, physical restraints have been used, such as tying a child's left hand behind their back.

In Japan, about one out of every ten people is left-handed. Therefore, left-handed people are the minority in society. There are also people who can only use one side of their body due to physical disabilities.

Innovators. Billionaire Bill Gates and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerburg are left-handers.

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. There is also the question of whether or not it is more common in boys than girls.

How many artists are left-handed? ›

Only about 10-15 percent of people are truly left-handed; however, a disproportionately large number of them are artists and musicians. We estimate around 35 percent of the musicians in string orchestras are left-handed.

“When you look at the cross of a handwritten T, a sharp point at the end of the bar will indicate where the writer quickly lifted the pen,” Ms. Kurtz says. “A left-handed person will usually end the stroke with the point ending on the left; for a righty, the T bar points right.”

Start clapping. Which hand is uppermost? Right-handed people typically have their right hand clapping onto their left. Left-handed people tend toward the opposite.

If you think your child doesn't have a dominant hand, place a variety of objects directly in front of her throughout the day and make note of which hand she uses to reach for them. When your tally reveals that she is choosing one hand about 70 percent of the time, you can assume that's her preferred side.

To be left-handed, both copies would have to be the left hand gene. That also means two lefties would always have left-handed children. This is not the case for your family or lots of others either. For example, if both parents are right-handed, there is a 1 in 10 chance of having a left-handed child.

Eleven percent of the population is born left-handed, and if they seem different, it's because they are!

Approximately 10% of all children are left-handed: about 11% of boys and 9% of girls. These statistics are consistent with findings in the literature on handedness.

Special or not, lefties are born, not made: Genetics are at least partially responsible for handedness. Up until last year, it was assumed that hand preference comes from asymmetrical genes in the brain—two hands, two brain hemispheres, one is dominant.

It's more common in twins

(It was also once thought that all left-handed people started out as twins, and that their rightie siblings died in the womb.) Neither of these is true, but left-handedness is about twice as common in twins than in the general population.

-Counting how many people are left-handed is more difficult than it looks, because of variations in preference and skill from task to task and because of left-handers having been forced to write with their right hand, but the best estimate we have is that roughly 10% of the world population is left-handed.

What do left handers struggle with? ›

A 2011 study from the American College of Chest Physicians suggested that left handers have significantly higher chances of developing periodic limb movement disorder (PLMD). This disorder is characterized by involuntary, repetitive limb movements that happen while you sleep, resulting in disrupted sleep cycles.

Our confidence intervals at a 95% confidence level show that the average IQ for a left handed person is between 117.73 and 127.19 and for a right handed person it is between 109.9 and 123.5.

However, post-hoc exploration of their and other sets of data has shown that there is an apparent tendency for left-handedness to be more prevalent in the period March-July than in the period August-February. The present work tested this seasonal hypothesis prospectively among university students.

Left-handedness was associated with differences in brain asymmetry in areas related to working memory, language, hand control and vision. Some of these brain areas were linked to specific genes. Scientists have long been fascinated by left-handedness.

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.

They found no difference in IQ levels among left- and right-handed people, but left-handers appeared to be more likely to have an intellectual disability. However, this study indicated that people who were intellectually gifted or following typical development were also just as likely to be left-handed.

The genes linked with left-handedness result in differences in brain structure, the scientists found. For the first time, scientists have identified the genetic differences associated with left-handedness, a trait found in 10% of the human population.

Although the percentage varies worldwide, in Western countries, 85 to 90 percent of people are right-handed and 10 to 15 percent of people are left-handed. Mixed-handedness (preferring different hands for different tasks) and ambidextrousness (the ability to perform tasks equally well with either hand) are uncommon.

This indicates that if females had a chance of being left-handed of exactly 10 percent, males would have a 12 percent chance (the exact percentages vary a bit depending on geographical region). Given the low incidence of left-handedness in general, this 2 percent increase is quite a substantial difference.