Our Brains Divided

Is there a cause for alarm if you find your baby boy or baby girl using his or her left hand most, if not all the time, to perform tasks like picking a toy up, holding the pencil, using the spoon, gripping you or even throw a ball?

The human brain has two cerebral hemispheres divided into the left and the right. The left hemisphere processes things more in parts and sequentially, and is the center for language, science, mathematics, and logic. This left side of the brain is usually dominant, and because the left side of the brain controls the right side of the body, these individuals are right-handed.

The right side of the brain synthesizes and is a source of dreams, fantasies, art, music, and feeling. In left-handed individuals the right side of the brain is dominant (and thus they are left-handed). Almost half of left-handers use their right hemisphere for language. In some left-handed people though, writing may be controlled completely and independently from the right hemisphere of the brain.

There is a tendency to label left-handers as more feeling oriented and talented in the arts than right-handers and one can point to examples of many individuals where this is the case. However, one cannot necessarily jump to the conclusion that left-handed individuals are “right-brained” in the sense that they are more talented in the arts or other so-called right-brain attributes.

Some studies show that the abilities of left-handers are as diverse as those of right-handers. In other words, human behaviour is more complex than can be explained by handedness alone. Intelligence, talent, and environmental factors interact with an individual’s pattern of hemispheric dominance and language localization.

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