[HN Gopher] Handedness as a determinant of lateral bias in human...
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Handedness as a determinant of lateral bias in human functional
cradling (2023)
Author : Tomte
Score : 40 points
Date : 2024-02-26 10:45 UTC (12 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (onlinelibrary.wiley.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (onlinelibrary.wiley.com)
| JR1427 wrote:
| I just looked back at some photos to confirm that I cradled our
| daughter right-sided.
|
| I'm right-handed, but do some other things left-handed too, like
| holding the knife in my left hand while eating. This has always
| seems much more logical to me, since the knife is a secondary
| tool. I hold the fork in my right hand regardless of if my left
| is holding a knife or not.
|
| I also notice that when raking leaves, or mopping a floor, I can
| never make up my mind which handedness feels more comfortable,
| and just switch between them.
|
| But I was very handed when it came to holding our daughter.
| Always her head on my right side, whether cradling or with her
| head on my shoulder. I didn't have a problem doing simple tasks
| with my free non-dominant (left) hand, but cradling a baby seemed
| too important a task to give to it!
| ubercore wrote:
| I play hockey left handed, but do everything else right handed.
| Has always felt natural to me, I can't remember ever doing
| differently.
| toxik wrote:
| > I hold the fork in my right hand regardless of if my left is
| holding a knife or not.
|
| Same, unless I'm cutting roast beef with a kitchen knife where
| the knife is the primary utensil.
|
| I think I could easily do the cutting with fork-left/knife-
| right, but as soon as I imagine the actual placing food into my
| mouth, I want my right hand.
| tudorw wrote:
| For fun, try switching the left and right mouse button actions,
| just give it a whirl, bizarrely I just took to it like water
| despite decades of muscle memory?!
| tmellon2 wrote:
| It is because you are using your dominant hand. Try switching
| the mouse with your non-dominant hand.
| pixl97 wrote:
| I'm from that generation where they were just getting over
| trying to make left handing kids right handed. Now that I'm
| older I find myself doing all kind of weird things...
|
| For example as a kid I had to use left handed scissors or I
| couldn't cut things, now I use right handed scissors in
| either hand. I switch my mouse to my right and left hand
| sometimes without thinking about it. My brain just
| transparently maps the right click to my left hand index
| finger. I throw with my right arm and shoot right handed,
| but when it comes to tool use I seem to be ambidextrous.
| This said, I can only write with my left hand.
| lukas099 wrote:
| > the knife is a secondary tool
|
| It is secondary overall, but during the act of cutting itself
| it is the primary tool -- the fork merely holds the food in
| place. Thus the differing "European" and American etiquette
| standards for utensil-holding (maintain fork in left hand vs.
| switch when cutting).
|
| ("European" in quotes because it is not ubiquitous across
| Europe [1])
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eating_utensil_etiquette
|
| What is most interesting to me is that we even have these
| arbitrary standards for social class judgement.
|
| When I was in Europe I made myself surprisingly uncomfortable
| trying to emulate the utensil etiquette of the people I was
| eating with. It was doubly painful when we ate pizza, which I
| wanted to pick up, fold in half and eat with my hands.
| cnity wrote:
| My read on the utensil thing is that basically keeping the
| fork in the left hand feels more "rushed" and therefore less
| delicate/dignified. I'm from the UK and my wife is American,
| and when I'm over there I do notice that if I forget to adapt
| my technique I sort of feel a little undignified in the way I
| eat, comparatively. It's interesting.
| brvsft wrote:
| > I also notice that when raking leaves, or mopping a floor, I
| can never make up my mind which handedness feels more
| comfortable, and just switch between them.
|
| I feel similarly. I think with a lot of these tasks, the stakes
| are low and the dominant hand can have an adequate effect in
| either placement.
|
| On the other hand (ahem), I do not feel this way about
| shoveling snow. I have to use my dominant hand on the far end
| of a snow shovel because I can generate more power with more
| control that way (despite my right arm having less muscle --
| per my other comment about my experience agreeing with this
| article, I hold my child with my left arm and now have more
| muscle on my left arm as a result). I think the aspect of being
| able to control the power feels more important because
| shoveling snow feels like, if I screw up the motion, I can
| potentially cause injury to myself.
| arghwhat wrote:
| I can't help but think that this is a very anticlimactic and
| obvious conclusion...
| phyzome wrote:
| Makes sense. I tend to carry things in my left hand to leave my
| dominant right hand free for other tasks. And cradling an infant
| while trying to get other stuff done is very, very common.
| brvsft wrote:
| I also hold my child with my left hand as I am right-handed.
| Obviously, it allows me to do more since my dominant hand is free
| for more complex tasks, as stated in the article.
|
| I only thought about this recently because I had a 'test' on my
| body that determined my left arm had more muscle than my right
| arm, and the person administering the test asked if I am left-
| handed as a result of this. I couldn't figure out why this would
| happen, thought about it for a day and realized the common
| repetitive motion I do that might strengthen my left arm
| significantly is _holding a 20+ lb child_.
| cnity wrote:
| I always heard that your dominant arm is usually weaker,
| because it is reserved for fine motor operations while your
| non-dominant arm bears load. Consider e.g. putting keys in a
| door while you carry groceries, etc.
| coolsunglasses wrote:
| Not what I've seen in strength training or among people doing
| physical labor (including my wife who used to be a
| carpenter).
| kjkjadksj wrote:
| I recently had an ultrasound done on both shoulders for
| reference. The doc said my dominant shoulder looked a lot
| worse
| bonton89 wrote:
| I've just heard your mind is better able to recruit strength
| from the dominate side so your body doesn't need to brute
| force it with extra muscle.
|
| My left pectoral is noticeably (to me) larger than my right
| dominate one. Not sure if that is the recruitment effect or
| if I somehow favor that side when lifting.
| groestl wrote:
| Now. Does lateral bias in cradling determine handedness in
| infants as well?
| walthamstow wrote:
| Wouldn't that mean all/most siblings have the same handedness?
| v8xi wrote:
| This is what I thought the article was saying until I read it.
| But if most babies are cradled on the mothers left, that would
| lead to the babies left side being more interacted with by the
| mother. Since most sensory information is processed
| contralaterally you would think it would bias towards left-
| handedness by strengthening connections in the right brain
| which is clearly not the case.
|
| However, smell (and taste, but I don't think that is relevant
| here) is processed ipsilaterally and vision/hearing have some
| ipsilateral processing so maybe I am wrong and it IS
| strengthening their left brain and leading to right handedness.
| metaphor wrote:
| The paper doesn't appear to consider impact of the child's
| weight, whether the task at hand demands strength/endurance v.
| dexterity/control, and the related natural strength bias between
| men and women.
|
| The wife is right-handed whereas I'm left-handed, and we both
| currently prefer cradling with our non-dominant arm; my
| prevailing driver is head control (while standing), whereas hers
| is both head control and dexterity during feeding (while
| sitting).
|
| Despite our daughter being just a month old and 9 lbs, the wife
| is already remarking that she's starting to get "heavy". As our
| child puts on more weight, I'm expecting to see the wife use her
| dominant arm more to cradle in certain scenarios, predicated by
| the baby's growth outpacing her arm strength buildup. In
| contrast, my non-dominant arm is notionally several times
| stronger than her dominant, so I suspect there will much fewer
| reasons for me to pivot as the child grows.
|
| As an aside, I truly do find it strange that child weight doesn't
| appear to be taken into any meaningful consideration. I
| understand that an innovation out of Europe which spread like
| wildfire in the US are car seats with rotating carriages (delayed
| adoption speculatively due to safety regulations). Many years
| ago, a close friend was first exposed to them when renting a car
| while on vacation in Iceland; he claimed that the UX of moving
| his daughter in and out was such a "game changer" that he
| immediately ordered one upon return, and it was one of the first
| things he recommended when I was soliciting wisdom in the months
| before my child was born.
| ecshafer wrote:
| When the child gets older and bigger, the thing that helps is
| not having to hold the head. So they get bigger, but you can
| put the kid on your hip and just hold them around the torso
| with your arm. So while they do get bigger, some of the issues
| goes away as they aren't as fragile.
| a_gnostic wrote:
| A baby sling helps.
| monkmartinez wrote:
| Lefty here as well, funny thing about my experience with two
| kids (now teenagers) was that I could get switch arms with no
| loss of functionality holding a baby. I credit this to living
| in right hand world. Most lefties I know are at least somewhat
| ambidextrous simply by fact of most things being built for,
| taught and learned from right-handed people.
| seabrookmx wrote:
| I don't know about ambidextrous (being able to perform a
| skill with either hand), but all the lefties I know are
| cross-dominant to some variety.
|
| For instance, I hold a pen, fork, soldering iron etc. with my
| left, but use a mouse with my right.
| monkmartinez wrote:
| You are correct and I have been using ambidextrous wrong
| for 40+ years. Never too old to learn something and I did
| today, so thank you!
|
| _Cross-Dominant_
|
| 1. Mixed preference: A cross-dominant individual favors
| different hands, eyes, or feet for different tasks. For
| example, they might write with their right hand, eat with
| their left hand, and kick a ball with their left foot.
|
| 2. No clear dominant side: They lack a single, strongly
| dominant side of the body, leading to a mixed pattern
| across various activities.
|
| 3. Potential Challenges: Cross-dominance can sometimes be
| associated with minor difficulties in coordination or
| activities requiring single-sided precision.
|
| _Ambidextrous_
|
| 1. Equal Skill: A truly ambidextrous individual can perform
| tasks with equal skill and control using either hand. This
| includes tasks that require fine motor skills, like
| writing.
|
| 2. Rarity: True ambidexterity is relatively uncommon.
|
| 3. Developed Skill: Often, ambidexterity is a learned
| ability and not an innate characteristic. People can train
| themselves to use both hands with near-equal proficiency.
|
| _In Summary:_
|
| Cross-dominant: Mixed hand/eye/foot preference for
| different tasks. Ambidextrous: Equal proficiency in using
| both hands for almost any task
| kiicia wrote:
| I am right handed but I use phone almost exclusively by
| left hand (when I use only one hand to hold and operate
| phone, like reading HN now), I am using right hand only
| when two-thumb-writing (like now)
| kjkjadksj wrote:
| If the baby is anything like a cat they will have their own
| side bias to account for too
| BurningFrog wrote:
| I don't understand the title, so I asked ChatGPT to rephrase it:
|
| _" How Being Right or Left-Handed Affects How We Hold Things"_
| lazide wrote:
| Specifically how we hold young children it seems?
| bookofjoe wrote:
| That's better. But I post this comment knowing that ANY praise
| of ChatGPT and its ilk here guarantees downvotes. This is NOT a
| friendly venue for AI. And that's an understatement.
| moate wrote:
| Commenting on the propensity of a comment to generate
| downvotes is also a great way to guarantee downvotes,
| especially if you're not providing much else to the discourse
| but a verbal upvote.
|
| Discourse on rhetoric.
| bookofjoe wrote:
| I'm waiting...
| medler wrote:
| Not really that close, since the most important thing about the
| title is that it's talking about cradling [babies].
|
| This is a good example of how ChatGPT often gives answers that
| seem plausible but are incorrect.
| codersfocus wrote:
| Interesting how study titles might be a good way of
| determining reading levels.
| etempleton wrote:
| I don't know, that is a tortured title. I got what it is
| saying, but it is about as unclear as one can be for no
| good reason other than to try and sound smart and I
| wouldn't judge someone's reading level based on their
| ability to parse that. I guess you could say that equates
| to reading level, but I think it equates more with one's
| familiarity with reading terrible academic papers. Which,
| yeah, I guess is a type of reading comprehension, but more
| of an exposure issue than anything else.
|
| The paper itself is actually refreshingly clear and direct.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| We had twins. Here's how I cradled them in crowded public places.
|
| My arms are out, palms up. A baby lays face down across my
| forearm, head toward my outside elbow. My hand has a firm hold on
| the upper part of the inside leg, the other leg hangs to the
| outside.
|
| It's a very secure hold. I can bring them into my chest if the
| sight of it failed to clear a path.
|
| Oh and I didn't wear a watch.
| etempleton wrote:
| I think it would be pretty obvious that handedness would
| influence preference here. I suspect left handed people are just
| more comfortable using their right hand for every day tasks
| because many items are designed for right hand use.
| marviel wrote:
| I wonder -- parents, when you're holding your toddler's hand,
| which do you generally use -- your secondary hand, or your
| primary hand?
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(page generated 2024-02-26 23:01 UTC)