Talk:Laterality

Merger proposal
"It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into handedness. (Discuss)"
 * strongly oppose merge for the reason stated below, laterality involves more than handedness, and handedness may also have more to it than laterality PinkPanther 15:38, 26th April, 2007
 * Do not merge. Laterality involves more than handedness. Ocular dominance is one example that comes to mind. AED 23:46, 21 October 2005 (UTC)
 * In my opinion, however, Handedness is one aspect of Laterality, and can be one section of the article. On the other hand, the article of Handedness is long enough to merit its own article, and in that case, it may be wiser to keep it as a separate article... Kareeser|Talk! 16:22, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Do not merge. But if you have to you could always summerize each artile with a


 * and so forth--E-Bod 02:12, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

I support a merge of a lot of this information. Handedness should merge in Right-handed, Cross-dominance, Ambidexterity, and a good chunk of Left-handed. Left-handed has some culture associated with it (e.g. "correlation between committing sexual crimes against children and being left-handed"[1]) so if there's strong feelings those parts could be retained in a separate article, although the article should be renamed to make it clear that its not just simply about left-handedness. Laterality doesn't add much, although it could be expanded -- if it isn't merged it should use "Main article" links. Footedness is mostly about skateboarding, maybe it could be moved to Boarding stance to make that clear. Ewlyahoocom 17:13, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Oppose merger. While they are maybe similar, they are quite different and should have different pages. Further, each page is quite long, so having a full page will all of the handednesses in them would be sickening to look at. The navigation template at the bottom of each page is good enough of a directory to jump from page to page. -- Jared  [T]/[+ ] 20:25, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Hmmm, are we looking at the same pages? Ambidexterity is 5 paragraphs; Cross-dominance is 3 sentences; Right-handed is 4 paragraphs; Laterality is 6 paragraphs. These are "long" pages? And that's not even discounting the bits that are already duplicated! Ewlyahoocom 20:39, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Oh, I take back what I said...I based what I said on the Left-handed page (without looking at the others), which is a whole dictionary in itself. While the other pages are short, yes, I believe it leaves room for improvement and the pages should be left separate. Maybe Amnidexterity and crossdominance should be combined, if anything, because they are so closely related. -- Jared  [T]/[+ ] 21:00, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Support merger. These articles are obvious candidates for merger. --Ignignot 17:44, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Support Merge. As far as I can tell, the laterality article and nearly all of the related ones proposed for merger, deal with biological, physiological, and possibly cognitive issues relevant to laterality in animals. These articles cover different aspects of laterality but are best understood when treated under a single umbrella category. Most of these articles, even the stubs, contain redundant information and require links to the other articles in order to fully understand any single sub-category.  Only the article on left-handedness has a reasonable need to be an independent article, and that is because left-handedness has a long cultural / social history that presents unique considerations beyond the biological ones. Ande B 06:32, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Oppose merge. Laterality would become too long for one thing, and left-handedness is a significant enough topic to warrant its own thread. Obviously a link in Laterality, but this is sufficient in my opinion.
 * Oppose merge. Per above. --Ktdreyer 21:59, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Oppose merge. I agree that handedness would benefit from the inclusion of the other hand-related topics (left-handed, right-handed, etc), but laterality should remain a seperate topic, since this really deals with the more specific issues of brain laterality, which does not correlate perfectly with handedness. For example, even among left-handers, the majority still show standard left-hemisphere lateralization for language abilities, as assessed by Wada test (see, e.g., Beaumont, 1983 p. 127).

From Talk:Handedness
The idea of merging all handedness articles together is a bad one. Wikipedia has space requirements and a single article can't do justice to all subjects. Durova 02:55, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I also agree with Durova, with the exception of the two articles cross-dominance and ambidexterity. Left-handedness and Right-handedness are long enough to merit their own articles. However, cross-dominance and ambidexterity can be easily merged, as they do not contain too much information. I will watch this page and carry out the merger in 10 days if (and only if) nobody replies. Kareeser|Talk! 02:58, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia's succes is also based on the importance of bringing individual standpoints to general sections. The merging of handedness articles is not a good idea. &mdash;The preceding unsigned comment was added by 151.198.55.168 (talk &bull; contribs) 21:40, 18 February 2006.
 * True, 151.198.55.168, but what of the two articles cross-dominance and ambidexterity? The two article are much too short to merit article on their own. If placed in the "handedness" article, they could be more easily accessed and contrbuted to, and in time, when enough information has gathered, they may once again be split into their own separate articles. Kareeser|Talk! 21:53, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

DO NOT MERGE!

From Talk:Handedness
This article shares a fair amount of material with left-handed; I'm not sure where it belongs, but I think it shouldn't be in both. -- pne 10:25, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Agreed. I think left-handed should be turned into a redirect to this article, with some tweaks here. - DavidWBrooks 11:44, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Right-handed should be the same way, too. - furrykef (Talk at me) 18:44, 30 September 2005 (UTC)

Definitely not. The term "laterality" is something students of psychology and biology might be looking up. The article should remain seperate and await more contributers who can write about studies concerning left and right hemispheres.

simply have a smaller wiki page for handedness in principle and examples thereof, two of which will be left/right handedness in humans.

What of Ambidexterity? --FlareNUKE 00:02, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
 * It's hard to find reliable information on ambidexterity. Few studies have been performed and the most if not all of them are compromised by sampling flaws. Durova 03:12, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

From Talk:Left-handed
This article shares a fair bit of material with handedness; I'm not sure where it belongs, but I think it shouldn't be in both. -- pne 10:24, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * : Agreed. I think left-handed should be turned into a redirect to handedness with some material shifted over. - DavidWBrooks 11:45, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Also, article laterality seems a bit superfulous Ianbrown 13:51, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * : Left-handedness has a specific and distinct cultural history. Perhaps the contents of handedness should be streamlined in order to limit shared material, but the article left-handedness is certainly relevant.


 * I agree, left-handedness is of enough cultural significance to have its own article. If anything, handedness should have its shared information removed since the majority of it deals specifically with left-handedness. I mean it's hard to put much information in about right-handedness that isn't pointless (like making a List of famous right-handed people). Handedness should just have a bit of information pertaining to handedness itself, things like most primates favoring one hand over the other, and the links to the right and left-handed pages.-GamblinMonkey 15:47, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * I agree: keep left-handedness in an article of its own. PatrickHadfield 17:01 BST 27 Mar 2006


 * I also agree, as I just looked up left-handedness expecting to find exactly such an article and not a general article about handedness.Josh 12:45, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Left-handedness is definitely long enough to be its own article. Cross dominance and embidexterity also pose a clear merger. The majority of people here seem to oppose the merging of handedness and footedness into Laterality, so I will remove the merge tags. Though ocular dominance has not been discussed, I will assume the same applies. If after a long time handedness, footedness, and ocular doominance are still not expanded, however, it may be wise to merge them here. Avraham 20:28, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

NO MERGER. if one sees that the main point of an encyclopedia is to distribute information then one must also see that an encyclopedia must make said information easy to find if one accepts those statements as true then one must think "what is someone who wishes to find out about left handedness likely look for it under" i would imagine that you would come to the conclusion that they are most likely to look for it under "left handedness" therefore no merger Unregistered text offender 10:35, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Merge = confusion
I agree, handedness IS a part of laterality, but handedness is more often than not talked about by itself. Handedness is a more obvious difference than laterality. Many people do not think about laterality as a collection of all dominances (or even know what laterality is), but rather talk about the individual dominances by themselves (right-handedness, left-footedness, etc).

If the merge were to occur, I believe there would be a lot of confusion for people who search wikipedia for specifically left/right-handedness. Someone who is new to the idea of laterality would see that they had been led to an article on laterality may be quite confused - I, myself, only just came across the word today, and only because of this discussion.

Just leave it as it is, it will save everyone a lot of confusion, and (as someone else pointed out) it will save the article from becoming an epic saga!

manda 08:15, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Oppose Merge: First of all this talk page is confusing because it has so many sections for different merges. I oppose all of the merges here because I feel that the articles about each hand are unique and require lengthy articles that would, like this talk page, result in a very confusing and lengthy article.Valley2city 22:51, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Opposed to Merger: We south-paws feel somewhat discriminated against - dare I say “oppressed”? – and would view a merger as a clear example of the dominant, right-handed, culture imposing its will upon us. Over the top you say? Try cutting all of next years Christmas wrapping with your left hand!--Larry In Cincinnati 18:38, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

This is a separate topic
Though handedness is a case of laterality..it is a well know case, which can be linked to laterality instead with a see also quote--Sathy 13:00, 19 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Agreed. Left-Handedness should be a seperate article, seeing as Right-Handedness exists and left-handedness does have enough to talk about.Killerrobotdude 04:22, 25 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Agreed; Oppose Merger. Most people are not looking for the larger (and more complicated) subject of laterality when searching for handedness.


 * Agree, definitely, keep these two separate.--Awesome Username 00:23, 25 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Oppose merger as merged article gets too long and compliacted. Tabletop 10:48, 26 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Oppose merger: Someone coming to the encyclopedia is much more likely to be asking a question about handedness than about the more obscure aspects of laterality - so burying the useful information that they seek inside another article is counter-productive. The articles need to be clearly and copiously cross-linked and some of the handedness information needs to be duplicated into the laterality article. SteveBaker 19:08, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Ear Laterality
Is there any way of finding out which ear is dominant? I tried finding out by closing each ear, and making a sound but it didn't work because a result only came out if I did it with both hands, and my right hand probably created a result by supplying more pressure. Any way to tell? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 209.68.148.253 (talk) 17:41, 7 December 2006 (UTC).

Two phrasings that should be altered a little..
1. Sinistra is the female form of the word "siniter, sinistra, sinistrum", but while dexter is cited in its male form, sinister is in its female form, which is - in my opinion - inconsequent. However, since the Latin sinister and the English "sinister" are two different words and don't have exactly the same meaning, I'm not sure whether it was a good idea to change the wording (and since I'm not an English native speaker, I just don't know what to change it into, anyway *g*) 2. I'd change "significant left-handed" into "significantly left-handed", cuz if there was any culture that "is left-handed", it'd be significant in respect to this topic, just by its mere existence. Any opinions? --FAeR (talk) 03:23, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Other Characteristics - Jump and Spin, Board Footedness
Should we add a section for other laterality characteristics, like these:

1) The Footedness in a board sport, which is not the same as the normal footedness: I am personally goofy on boards, but otherwise kick soccer, skate, and perform all other activities with my dominating right leg.

2) Direction of rotation in Figure skating jumps and spins and in other sports: "Jumps can be performed with either clockwise or counter-clockwise rotation. The vast majority of skaters rotate all their jumps and spins in the same direction; counter-clockwise jumping is more common than clockwise." --Alefu (talk) 02:25, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Crabs
Mention crabs... very asymmetric. Jidanni (talk) 02:03, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

Bias towards human handedness....
The article seems very focused on the human handedness aspects of laterality, at the expense of the more general topic of asymmetries, in both human and non-human species. OTOH, the publishers of the journal Laterality indicate that the field covers "the psychological, behavioural and neurological correlates of lateralisation ....(and research that) can illuminate the general problems of the evolution of biological and neural asymmetry, papers on the cultural, linguistic, artistic and social consequences of lateral asymmetry, and papers on its historical origins and development". At present we offer no cites of that journal at all.

I'm tempted to propose a rework effort to refocus this page on a decent treatment of the actual topic in the title. But I don't want to waste much time on it, without decent buy-in (and assistance) from other editors. However, the job does appear to be a bit less daunting than than trying to organize the various handedness pages, given the tatty content and anecdotal crud that historically seems to keep building up there... :-) jxm (talk) 01:11, 12 August 2014 (UTC)

Title of page
Wouldn't a better title for this article be "Behavioural laterality"? DrChrissy (talk) 17:28, 22 June 2015 (UTC)

Learning to tell left and right
This might lead to some interesting sources for expanding this article:

WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:34, 24 June 2016 (UTC)

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COI - please help
I suggest the following two additions: A. Immediately under the Heading "Birds" add... Laterality in non-human species was first discovered in birds. Fernando Nottebohm [26] showed that singing in songbirds is controlled by one hemisphere and Lesley Rogers discovered that domestic chicks use the right eye and left hemisphere to find grains scattered on a background of pebbles and the left eye and right hemisphere for attack and copulation behaviour [27].

Pigeons also have lateralized brains. They also discriminate grains from pebbles using their right eye and left hemisphere[28].

26 Nottebohm, F. (1971) Neural lateralization of vocal control in a Passerine bird. I. Song. Journal of Experimental Zoology 177, 299-261. 27 Rogers, L.J. and Anson, J.M. (1979) Lateralisation of function in the chicken forebrain. Pharmacology, Biochemistry and Behaviour, 10, 679-686. 28 Güntürkün, O. (1993) The ontogeny of visual lateralization in pigeons. German Journal of Psychology, 17, 276-287.

B Please add immediately under the heading "Invertebrates" Laterality is present in social bees. Honeybees (Apis mellifera), for example, can learn and remember odours associated with a food reward (sugar) only when using their right antenna but after 6 hours they remember this only when using their left antenna [36].

36. Rogers, L.J. and Vallortigara, G. (2008) From antenna to antenna: Lateral shift of olfactory memory recall by honeybees. PLoS ONE 3 (6), e2340.

Thanks for your help. Cheers Uddermudder (talk) 04:08, 30 April 2020 (UTC)