The areas with higher rates of left handedness on the map seem to correlate to the more progressive areas where you’d expect parents and teachers to not discourage it. Was kind of surprised they didn’t mention that, given they started with that anecdote.
The surprising geography of American left-handedness (2015)
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Re: The surprising geography of American left-handedness (2015)
#12The geographical weirdness: left-handedness is much more widespread in Northeast, with some less prominent peaks in Florida, Arizona, South Dakota. The source is suggested to be genetic. I wonder if there's information on how many passengers of the Mayflower were left-handed.
My son is left handed. Nobody else in my or my wife’s family is or has been left handed, that we know of. And we don’t live in one of the mentioned areas. It seems odd, but I’ve never looked into it.
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Re: The surprising geography of American left-handedness (2015)
#13I do recall preferring the left hand on my first day with a pencil. However, during that first day, I remember being able to switch to use my right hand as well and it started to feel more comfortable after a very short time. The tipping point was the frustration of using my right hand and failing to be able to control it correctly. I swapped to my (then-worse) left hand and was willing to deal with the frustration better. By the second day, my right hand was too alien and I only switched back briefly in my early 30s due to injuring my left arm/hand, where I basically had pre-school level right-hand cursive.
As far as I know, I'm the only left hander in my extended family.
Re: The surprising geography of American left-handedness (2015)
#14My parents "retrained" me to be right-handed. All primary-school things like writing, using scissors, etc. I do right-handed. For the rest? All I am is confused - some things I do right-handed, others left-handed. FWIW I was a very awkward and uncoordinated kid, which...may be related?
Re: The surprising geography of American left-handedness (2015)
#15The geographical weirdness: left-handedness is much more widespread in Northeast, with some less prominent peaks in Florida, Arizona, South Dakota. The source is suggested to be genetic. I wonder if there's information on how many passengers of the Mayflower were left-handed.
My son is left handed. Nobody else in my or my wife’s family is or has been left handed, that we know of. And we don’t live in one of the mentioned areas. It seems odd, but I’ve never looked into it.
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Re: The surprising geography of American left-handedness (2015)
#16The archive.org link doesn't seem to have captured TFA. https://archive.ph/y543P
Thank you! I was wondering why a one-paragraph story was posted here with the real content in two links you'd have to follow. Your version has some actual content.
Re: The surprising geography of American left-handedness (2015)
#17After the resurgence of homophobia, racism, antivax, misogyny, I've been wondering if we're undoing the last couple of centuries of civilization. I never expected the next step to be left-handedness becoming associated with evil again.
Re: The surprising geography of American left-handedness (2015)
#18Earlier quoted context omitted.
My son is left handed. Nobody else in my or my wife’s family is or has been left handed, that we know of. And we don’t live in one of the mentioned areas. It seems odd, but I’ve never looked into it.
I’m the same. No one in my family tree going back to my great grandparents were lefties. Nor any cousins or 2nd cousins. Just me.
Me and my sister are left-handed, but nobody else in our family. And suddenly not one but two kids? (We're not twins.)
Re: The surprising geography of American left-handedness (2015)
#19Why is it that right-handed people play stringed instruments such that the strings are actuated with the right hand (finger picking, flatpicking, strumming, bowing), and fingered with the left? Many left handed players reverse the arrangement.
On the other hand (pun inteneded) left-handed pianos are almost unheard of.
Re: The surprising geography of American left-handedness (2015)
#20My parents "retrained" me to be right-handed. All primary-school things like writing, using scissors, etc. I do right-handed. For the rest? All I am is confused - some things I do right-handed, others left-handed. FWIW I was a very awkward and uncoordinated kid, which...may be related?
I too am mixed regarding doing things with different hands - for finer movements (writing, holding a spoon) I prefer using the left hand, while for stronger movements (punching, throwing a ball) I prefer using the right hand. Not sure why though, I never underwent any "retraining".