Among the people who have achieved worldwide recognition in science, art, politics, business and sports, one in five is left-handed. Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great, Napoleon Bonaparte, Leonardo da Vinci and Albert Einstein, US Presidents Bush Sr., Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton - these people with the "wrong" grip cannot be called ordinary. Lefties even have a professional holiday
Left-handedness is much broader than just left-handed preference. A person can be dominated by the left leg, ear or eye. In human society, "left-handed" and "right-handed" are related as 1:10. Unlike humans, any group of animals is usually divided equally into right-handers and left-handers.
Most people are right-handed. It is more convenient for them to do everything with their right hand - it is their leading one. The left hemisphere of the brain "commands" the right hand. It is it - the leader among right-handers - that is responsible for reading, speaking, writing, and logic of reasoning. But almost a quarter of the planet's population is more agile in wielding the left hand.
The journalist - "Dagpravdin" Abdurakhman Magomedov publishes a book with the mysterious title "Ambidexters". It turns out that these are people who wield the right and left hands equally dexterously. I remembered: we have two ambidexters working in surgery who are very good at using both hands. We all envy them.
Those who find it more convenient to work with the left hand can be divided into 4 groups.
1. Those who inherited left-handedness. There are 9-11% of such on the planet. Their leading hemisphere is right. It is it that is responsible for their speech, reading, logic. And the number of such people on the planet does not depend on either the climate or the race, it does not change from century to century.
2. Compensatory left-handers. These are those in whom the left hemisphere of the brain, which is responsible for the work of the right hand, was injured during childbirth or pregnancy of the mother. Then the right hemisphere takes over the leading function, and the left hand becomes the leading one. Compensatory left-handers are often children of late mothers, because pregnancy in such mothers is often difficult and ends in difficult childbirth. Such left-handers are not uncommon among three or four twins - i.e. in cases where conditions for fetal development were unfavorable. Compensatory left-handers among us are 12-13%, and in developed countries there are more and more of them, because more and more late children are born there.
3. Involuntarily left-handed people who received a hand injury (and not a brain!) In early childhood. If a child breaks his right hand, burns it, pinches a finger on it and begins to take care of this hand and tries to do everything with the left, which becomes more trained and skillful. And already at school it turns out that he writes poorly with his left hand, which speaks of the intactness of the leading hemisphere, which "supervises" the right hand. Forced to left-handed in the world - 2-3%.
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4. Imitative left-handers - there are fewer of them, half a percent. Genetically, they are not left-handed, but, imitating their father or brother - true left-handed, they began to do everything with their left hand.
Among musicians, 20% are left-handed, and even more among artists. Science has not found an explanation for these facts. Moreover: 8 out of 10 people are "right-handed" on the right leg, 7 out of 10 - in the right eye, 6 out of 10 - in the right ear.
By the way, the process of "leftward" of the nation did not begin here yesterday. It is known, for example, that in the 1920s in Russia left-handers accounted for 3.3% among women and 4.7% among men, and at the end of the 1980s, respectively, 12.2 and 13.9%. Naturally born left-handers are 80% more likely to suffer from allergic diseases, among them there are more alcoholics and suicides. According to statistics, left-handers live 5 years less than right-handers.
Left-handers are people of the right hemisphere, they are distinguished by increased sensitivity and excitability. They perceive the world and think differently, because their right hemisphere of the brain dominates, the task of which is the holistic perception of the world, visual images and sounds, painting and music. It is associated with concepts such as intuition and comprehension of situations. The left hemisphere is responsible for logic, analysis, and abstract thinking. It serves to understand and reproduce speech, counting and writing.
If both parents were right-handed, then 67.3% of children were right-handed, 27.7% were ambidexters and 4.2% were left-handed. If both parents are left-handed, then 48.9% are right-handed children, 27.7% are mixed, and 23.4% are left-handed. Among parents of mixed hands, children in 37.7% are right-handed, in 52.9% are mixed and in 9.4% of cases are left-handed. 2,500 left-handers die a year by taking on equipment designed for right-handers.
Experts believe that left-handers have a much stronger concrete-figurative quality, they are more impressionable, excitable, prone to emotional outbursts and a sharp change in mood. That is why there are so many left-handed actors, composers, poets and artists. But exact sciences, as a rule, are difficult for left-handers.
The genetic left-hander can never be retrained. He is left-handed because his brain is structured differently. At the same time, he can have a very precise coordination of movements, be a skilled craftsman, who will “cheat” a flea, like Leskov's Lefty. You cannot retrain a compensatory left-hander. His body adapted, the healthy hemisphere took over the work of the "damaged" one. And we sometimes, by shifting a pen from the left hand to the right for such a child, we want to make the damaged part of the brain work. And one more thing: writing is one of the most difficult skills that a person masters. You cannot train your hand in writing.
The advantage of this or that hand does not appear earlier than 4.5 years. If not everything is clear, then how to determine whether the baby is left-handed, if he holds the spoon with his right or with his left, and at the same time wields both hands equally dexterously? Invite him to draw a house, first with one hand, then with the other. Which drawing is the best? With which hand he will pick up the ball from the floor and throw it to you. Untie several loosely tied knots on the cord. Build a house, a tower from cubes. Open several matchboxes in search of a hidden button. Count how often the left hand was leading in these tasks.
Hand dominance appears to varying degrees. The researchers cite the following features of left-handed people. Many right-handers are completely right-handed, but no left-hander is completely left-handed. Entering an unfamiliar room, the left-hander will turn to the left, and the right-hander - to the right. Premature babies are 5 times more likely to be left-handed. Women in their 40s are more likely to give birth to left-handers. The percentage of left-handed smokers is much higher than right-handed smokers.
And in conclusion: the history of mankind has proved that left-handers are no worse than others. They are just different.