Pick a hand, any hand: mixed-handedness and night-sky watching in a college student sample.(Report)

This study explored the relationship between handedness and interest in night-sky watching. University students (N=128) completed the Edinburgh Handedness Inventory (Oldfield, 1971) and the Noctcaelador Inventory (Kelly, 2004). The findings indicated that mixed-handed participants scored highest on noctcaelador relative to those classified as either left or right-handed. The results and suggestions for future research are discussed.

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Broca's (1861) case-report indicating that damage to an area in the lower, left frontal lobe of the brain (Broca's Area) is associated with impaired speech production spurred scientists to further explore behaviors and mental processes associated with localized brain functioning. Continued research in this area led to findings that the cerebral cortex of the brain is split into two hemispheres, left and right (Sperry, 1968). Moreover, studies intimated that cortical functioning is generally asymmetrical; that is, one hemisphere is usually dominant in specific functions (of., Omstein, 1997).

One of the largest literatures related to hemisphericity (the lateralization of brain cortical functioning) is the research on handedness, the hand that humans prefer to use across various tasks (Annett, 1985). Handedness has been reported as an adequate indicator of hemispheric dominance (Coulson & Lovett, 2004; Knecht et al., 2000). The stronger an individual's left-hemispheric dominance, the more right-handed the individual; the more right hemisphere dominant, the more left-handed an individual.

Findings from handedness research indicated that left-handed individuals (relative to right-handed individuals) had more divergent thought processes (Coren, 1995) and were more emotionally expressive (Jackson, 2005). Hemisphere functioning has also been related to affective style. For example, left-handers have been found to be more vulnerable to experiencing negative affective reactions, such as stress. Right-handers, conversely, were more likely to experience positive affective states (Tomarken, Davidson, & Henriques, 1990; Wheeler, Davidson, & Tomarken, 1993).