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Normal distribution of hand preference and its bimodality
1Atatürk University, Medical Faculty, Department of Physiology Erzurum, Turkey.
The International Journal of Neuroscience
|January 1, 1993
Summary
The Waterloo Handedness Questionnaire provides a more detailed assessment of hand preference than concise tools. Right-handedness shows normal distribution, while left-handedness is more varied, suggesting anomalous dominance.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Psychology
- Human Biology
Background:
- Hand preference, or handedness, is a fundamental human trait.
- Understanding the distribution and characteristics of handedness is crucial for neurological and psychological research.
- Previous studies have used various tools to quantify handedness, with varying degrees of detail.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the distribution of hand preference in human subjects.
- To compare the efficacy of the Waterloo Handedness Questionnaire (WS) and the Edinburgh Handedness Inventory (GS) in assessing handedness.
- To explore the relationship between different measures of handedness and the concept of anomalous dominance.
Main Methods:
- Utilized The Waterloo Handedness Questionnaire and the Edinburgh Handedness Inventory to collect data on hand preference.
- Calculated Waterloo Handedness scores (WS) and Geschwind Scores (GS) for each subject.
- Categorized subjects into distinct left-handed (WS < 0; GS < 0) and right-handed (WS > 0; GS > 0) groups.
Main Results:
- Waterloo Handedness scores (WS) exhibited a normal distribution when considering only right-handers.
- Geschwind Scores (GS) also showed a near-normal distribution for right-handers, though less pronounced than WS.
- A significant positive-linear correlation was observed between WS and GS.
- Left-handers displayed a widely dispersed distribution of scores, unlike the normal distribution of right-handers.
Conclusions:
- The Waterloo Handedness Questionnaire is more appropriate for assessing hand preference due to its detailed nature compared to concise questionnaires.
- The observed normal distribution of right-hand preference and dispersed distribution of left-hand preference support the theory of anomalous dominance in left-handedness.