Ambilaterality: definition from handedness preference questionnaires and potential significance

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Psychology
• Human Behavior

Background:

• Handedness is commonly defined using preference questionnaires.
• Current definitions often rely on extremes or equal divisions of the handedness range.
• This can lead to the exclusion of ambilateral (ambidextrous) individuals or failure to identify intermediate handedness scores.

Purpose of the Study:

• To highlight the limitations of current handedness definitions.
• To emphasize the importance of analyzing the full handedness spectrum, including intermediate scores.
• To advocate for scoring methods that identify subjects within the middle handedness range.

Main Methods:

• Review of existing literature on handedness definitions and their implications.
• Presentation of examples illustrating characteristics of subjects with weak right-handedness.
• Discussion of the impact of different handedness definitions on subject inclusion and analysis.

Main Results:

• Standard handedness definitions may exclude ambilateral subjects or fail to distinguish intermediate scores.
• Subjects with weak right-handedness exhibit distinct characteristics compared to other groups.
• Current methods may not adequately capture the nuances of the handedness spectrum.

Conclusions:

• Handedness research should adopt more inclusive definitions.
• A scoring method that identifies subjects in the middle handedness range is necessary.
• Comprehensive analysis of the entire handedness spectrum provides richer insights into human lateralization.