Development of an Inventory to Identify Psychosocial Factors Influencing Hand Usage: the CHUC

To develop the first inventory to measure psychosocial concerns about use of the non-preferred hand, toward the long-term goal of identifying the casual factors of left-right hand choices ("hand usage").

Cross-sectional.

Online question battery.

181 healthy adults.

Not applicable.

Self-reported concerns about emotional and physical consequences of using the non-preferred hand.

Emotional and physical consequences reflected internally consistent categories (Cronbach's α > 0.9) that were moderately correlated with each other (ρ = 0.783 p = 0.002). Concerns were activity-dependent in each category (p < 1×10^-100). Reliability analysis and principal components analysis were used to reduce the battery to the 51-item Changed Hand Usage Concerns inventory, which encompasses everyday tasks and concerns about physical and emotional consequences of using the non-preferred hand in those tasks.

Concerns about emotional vs. physical consequences of non-preferred hand use reflect coherent and internally consistent categories The Changed Hand Usage Concerns inventory allows assessment of psychosocial concerns about usage of the non-preferred hand for future attempts to manipulate hand usage via rehabilitation in patients with unilateral or asymmetric impairment.