Talk:Left-handed
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Isn't there a complex relationship between left handedness, left footedness etc? Also, lots of historical stuff about repression. Mark Richards 00:11, 6 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Rewrote the sentence "One of the authors of this article can attest to the difficulty of writing legible Chinese characters with her left hand." Wikipedia articles should not refer to their authors. If a reference is necessary, it should be to previously published work. arj 18:21, 31 May 2004 (UTC)
From the article: "Gay people may be up to 39% as likely to be left-handed as straight people (Habib, 2000)." This is difficult to understand. What does this mean, precisely?
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Life expectancy
I can't remember where I saw the stat., maybe someone could corroborate, but I read once that left-handed people have a shorter life expectancy (not by much, 1-2 yrs. maybe) due primarily to auto accidents in countries where cars drive on the right. Left handed people instinctively jerk the steering wheel to the left (and presumably into oncoming traffic) when startled.
I'd assume that it's true. I had heard it a few times before and eventually saw it on one of those TV shows that does research to debunk myths. Not only are we (I'm left-handed) more likely to have car accidents, and because of those have a better chance at dying, but we're more likely to have accidents involving power tools since almost all that require two hands (saws for example) are set up for right-handed people. This causes a left handed person to either try to reverse hands in a very awkward manner, or hold it properly, although without the precision of a right-handed person, since they're holding it the reverse of what feels natural. This of course, causes very bad accidents, and is another cause of early death for left-handers. If I remember, or if someone else wants to do it, I'll try to verify this and add some more information about it later. -GamblinMonkey 15:33, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)
The research is probably that of Stanley Coren. A fairly well summarised and researched article by Cecil Adams (Straight Dope) that should make a good research start point is at http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a5_092.html, should GamblinMonkey or anyone else want to look into it further - Kvetch 15:03, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Sun Worship causes Social Stigma for Lefties?
This contribution to the main article makes little sense (my additions are in parentheses):
"It is possible that sun worship relates to the association of the left with evil. People in the northern hemisphere, looking south, would see the sun rise on their left, move rightwards across the sky, and set on their right. In the southern hemisphere the opposite happens (when one faces north). Among cultures from the southern hemisphere, right-handedness is still dominant. No study on left-side connotations from those cultures has been done.
However, since most sun-worshipping cultures see the setting sun as it dying or vanishing, the right side would indicate the negative associations associated with a setting sun. This is the opposite trend from that (provided that one is not facing north in either hemisphere)."
No offence is intended, but it doesn't seem to provide any evidence either way. Am I missing something?
Cheers, Donovan. 13:27, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)
- It strikes me as a load of hooey ... why does this only kick when they're when facing south? Facing north (due to the fixed nature of the north star) tends to be more prominent in cultural activities. - DavidWBrooks 13:34, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)
- I've edited it to reflect what we know. Cheers, Donovan. 02:45, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Shared material with handedness
This article shares a fair bit of material with handedness; I'm not sure where it belongs, but I think it shouldn't be in both. -- pne 10:24, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
- : Agreed. I think left-handed should be turned into a redirect to handedness with some material shifted over. - DavidWBrooks 11:45, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
- Also, article laterality seems a bit superfulous Ianbrown 13:51, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- : Left-handedness has a specific and distinct cultural history. Perhaps the contents of handedness should be streamlined in order to limit shared material, but the article left-handedness is certainly relevant.
- I agree, left-handedness is of enough cultural significance to have its own article. If anything, handedness should have its shared information removed since the majority of it deals specifically with left-handedness. I mean it's hard to put much information in about right-handedness that isn't pointless (like making a List of famous right-handed people). Handedness should just have a bit of information pertaining to handedness itself, things like most primates favoring one hand over the other, and the links to the right and left-handed pages.-GamblinMonkey 15:47, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Material removed from the intro
I have removed the following material from the intro, where it certainly doesn't belong. If someone can find a good place for it in the article, please go ahead and insert it there!
- The term southpaw is often used to describe left-hand people, because in baseball, the first base side of the baseball diamond (towards the pitcher's left side) was often towards the south. Those pitchers who were lefthanded, were thus called "southpaws".
--Niels Ø 13:46, May 21, 2005 (UTC)
Is left-handedness genetic?
Handedness runs in families, although even when both parents are left-handed, there is only a 26% chance of their child being left-handed. Thus, it is clear that genetics is not the only cause. Handedness must also be influenced by some of the other theories presented here.
Apparently, the Clan Kerr of Scotland built their castles with counter-clockwise staircases, so that a left-handed swordsman would be better able to defend it. However, a 1993 study found no statistically significant increase in left-handedness among people with the family name Kerr or Carr.
Many members of the British royal family are left-handed. Genetics is usually used to explain this.
> Anybody got a link to information regarding the 1993 study, I'm a Carr, and I'm left handed, so I'd like to read about it!