SAEDNEWS: American researchers have recently stated that brain scan results show left handed people think differently from right handed individuals. They tend to use the right hemisphere of their brain more for certain tasks and functions. Experts believe that these differences in brain activity may make creative thinking easier.
According to SAEDNEWS, Have you ever wondered whether being right handed or left handed can influence how creative you are? Scientists have been studying human handedness for more than a century, and they have discovered that being right handed or left handed can reveal many differences in how the human brain functions. Since creativity is a measure of the way we think, any evidence suggesting that left handed people are more creative should be reflected somewhere within our neural circuits.
Eric Zillmer, a professor of neuropsychology at Drexel University in the United States, says that left handed people show less brain lateralization compared with right handed individuals. Brain lateralization refers to the division of the human brain into two hemispheres (the left and right hemispheres), with each side being responsible for a specific set of functions.
The left hemisphere is generally associated with speech, writing, mathematics, language, and comprehension, while the right hemisphere is involved in creativity, musical abilities, and artistic expression.
If a researcher started a conversation with you and scanned your brain using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), the left hemisphere, which is linked to language, would be expected to show greater activity than the right hemisphere. Researchers have observed this pattern in most right handed people: when performing language related tasks, their left brain hemisphere becomes more active than the right.
However, scientists have found that this pattern does not apply to most left handed individuals. Many left handed people actually show greater activity in their right hemisphere when performing language tasks. Zillmer explained that because left handed people rely less on the left hemisphere, researchers describe this as evidence of reduced brain lateralization. This difference is not limited to language alone, as the brains of left handed and right handed people differ in several other ways as well.
A 2010 study on handedness and face perception found that left handed people use both the left and right hemispheres of the brain when looking at faces. However, in the right handed participants in the study, facial recognition was largely concentrated in the right hemisphere.
Zillmer explained that these differences in brain lateralization may help left handed individuals think more outside the box and, as a result, develop greater creativity. Creative thinking may come more naturally to some left handed people.
Some of the most compelling research connecting handedness and creativity comes from studies of individuals with high levels of schizotypy (personality traits that resemble schizophrenia but are not as extreme).
In the early 2000s, several research groups discovered an interesting link between highly creative individuals, such as professional musicians and visual artists, and elevated levels of schizotypy. In addition, people with noticeable schizotypy showed unusual patterns of brain lateralization, in which the right hemisphere was more active during tasks that are typically controlled by the left hemisphere. This pattern is similar to what has been observed in left handed and ambidextrous individuals.
The possibility that left handed people may be more creative could also be partly explained by the way they adapt to a world designed mainly for right handed individuals.
Therefore, if unusual brain lateralization is associated with higher creativity in people with elevated schizotypy, it may suggest that left handed individuals with less brain lateralization could also have greater creative abilities. However, further research is needed to directly confirm this connection.
It is worth noting that the right hemisphere plays a role in divergent thinking, which is the ability to approach a specific problem creatively by generating multiple unique solutions. Divergent thinking is a cognitive process that involves exploring many possible answers to create innovative ideas.
Katina Bajaj said that this may provide opportunities for left handed individuals to rely more on their imagination, which can help them develop creativity.
Bajaj added that our creative brain is activated when we engage in new and unfamiliar experiences. Since left handed people are constantly navigating a world that often requires them to think differently, they may get more practice using their imagination, making it easier to access creative thinking over time.
Therefore, being left handed does not automatically make someone more creative, but as the brain develops and adapts, it may encourage a more creative style of thinking.
Researchers do not know exactly why around ten percent of the world’s population is left handed. However, some studies have provided clues about how and when handedness develops. In one study, researchers found that they could reasonably predict a child’s hand preference by observing which hand the baby preferred to move while in the womb.
A more recent study in 2020 showed that being right handed or left handed is at least partly inherited and may be influenced by genetic factors.
Zillmer said that environmental factors cannot be ignored. For example, a child whose parents are left handed may become left handed by imitating them, regardless of which hand they preferred to use before birth. This is likely related to gene expression, and the same principle may also apply to creativity.
Bajaj explained that some research suggests certain people are born with a greater tendency to be open to new experiences than others. From her perspective, creativity requires practice, and the more we develop it, the more it expands.
The main point is this: if you want to become more creative, practice. If you want to use your left hand more, practice. With enough determination, your brain has the ability to adapt, develop, and be shaped according to your efforts.
Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics have suggested that the function of a specific gene called NME7 and certain areas of brain anatomy play important roles in determining whether a person is right handed or left handed. German researchers found that, in addition to genetics, specific structural features of the brain are also associated with handedness.
Scientists have long been interested in understanding why some people are left handed. This is because left handedness is linked to brain asymmetry, meaning that the two hemispheres of the brain control different skills and abilities. In right handed individuals, the left hemisphere controls the right hand, while in left handed individuals, the opposite pattern occurs.
In most people, the left hemisphere is responsible for language dominance, but this pattern is often different in left handed individuals. Clyde Francks, one of the researchers involved in the study, said that understanding the role of each hemisphere in language and other cognitive functions is very important. Various psychiatric conditions, including autism, schizophrenia, and intellectual disabilities, have been associated with higher rates of left handedness; however, it should be noted that most left handed people do not have these conditions. Understanding why right handedness and left handedness are linked to brain asymmetry and how genes contribute to this process is therefore highly important.
To investigate the neurological and genetic foundations of left handedness, compare differences between left handed and right handed individuals, and measure brain asymmetry, researchers analyzed imaging data from the large medical database of the UK Biobank.
After analysis, researchers found that right handed people differed from left handed individuals in terms of brain asymmetry across ten specific brain regions on average. In all ten regions, the gray matter of the right hemisphere was relatively larger in left handed individuals. This finding was associated with increased neural resources supporting the role of the right hemisphere in controlling the left hand.
Scientists also discovered that genetics influence handedness and are linked to brain asymmetry in regions involved in language. Interestingly, one of the genes involved is NME7, as this gene affects the positioning of body organs, such as the heart and liver, and whether they are located on the right or left side of the body. According to Francks, handedness and language may have been connected during human brain development and may share a common evolutionary history.
