cross dominance - mixed handedness

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  • Just wondered how common on here as irl I hardly ever meet anyone that has different hand dominance for different things.

    I'm not that extreme but I write, draw, throw and play raquette sports right handed.
    I play snooker/pool left handed, have to have the knife in my left hand when I eat and open jars and bottles left handed. I'm also left footed.

    Some people are very extreme, like writing with one hand using scissors with the other, shooting basketballs with one hand but throwing smaller balls with the other.

  • Right handed everything, I hold my knife and fork the wrong way around.

  • Born left hand dominant(both parents lefties so learned everything left at first).
    Strict High Anglican primary school made me use my right hand because Satan.

    Nowadays I write with my right hand but left hand dominant while using most hand tools. Throw/catch is a fairly even split.
    Unconscious reflex(catching a knocked over pint etc) is 100% left hand. Left foot forward on a skateboard.

    My handwriting is fucking dire with both hands.

  • Write and ‘art’ left hand. DIY and ‘mouse’ right hand. Right footed with a ball. Goofy-foot on a skateboard.

  • I knew there'd be a load of mixed brain weirdos on here!

  • Knife and fork thing is so weird. I'm reasonably decent at most things with my weaker hand but I can't even attempt to eat with the knife in my right and fork in the left. Just doesn't work

  • I’m fork left, knife right.
    Unless I’m eating super noodles in which case fork is in right hand.

  • Am naturally left handed but was forced to write/draw right handed at school which is why I hold a pen funny.
    Used to eat with a knife/fork whichever way I picked them up and was never asked to lay the table as never put things on the right side.
    Use scissors in either hand and some hand tools but over the years my right side has become more dominant, some things like mice or touchpads I can use left handed without thinking but mostly use a Wacom pen in my right hand.
    Have a left master eye so use left eye for photography, can do archery using bow on either side but shoot left handed.
    So nurture has overcome nature for some things not others.

  • Left handed with most things.

    Switch hit in cricket and baseball but throw exclusively left handed (throwing stones at the seaside with your non dominant hand usually results in much humour for my kids watching, the learned dynamics are just not there

    Right handed on the few times I've played golf. Swinging a golf club "the wrong way" is weird.

    Kicking is left dominant but I've a passable right foot unlike most of the England team.

  • Missread the thread title and throught it was about domination.

    Amazed that people were forced to use their right hands as recently as edmundro went to school (sorry Mr Smyth no gauge of your age). My dad always referenced it with my kids in a sort of "of course it's fine if you're gay nowadays" way, that I always found odd. But maybe he was on to something.

  • I don’t know anyone else my age(turned 39 last week) who was denied their left hand at school.
    My older brother had the same treatment but went back to being left handed as soon as he hit secondary school. The brainwashing stuck a little harder with me.
    I broke my left hand/wrist in several places aged 12 or 13 as well so there was a long period where I wouldn’t have been able to use it anyway.

    I work in props/scenery and over the years I’d say at least 50% of the folks I’ve worked with are left handed. Same goes for all the people who have tattooed me- massive overrepresentation of lefties compared the the 1 in 8 or whatever it is in society at large.

  • I work in props/scenery and over the years I’d say at least 50% of the folks I’ve worked with are left handed. Same goes for all the people who have tattooed me- massive overrepresentation of lefties compared the the 1 in 8 or whatever it is in society at large.

    11% of the population are left handed, it was 25% at the art college i attended.

    @hugo7 im ‘just over 50’ think this would have been started in nursery or maybe it was infants where written work was increased. I think there should be a class action against councils/education authorities for the trauma caused by this policy. :-)

  • .

  • Slightly mixed but not really through choice:

    Left sided writing, cricket, football, darts, scissors.

    Right handed golf, guitar (both rarely used and pretty badly!), no choice for hockey.

    Switch between both hands using the mouse at work (to solve shoulder problems).

    Can't throw overarm right handed to save my life. Preferred to pass right at rugby.

    Can write pretty legibly & quickly right handed.

    Always assumed more lefties with ambidextrous traits than right handers?

  • Assumed more lefties with ambidextrous traits

    This is almost certainly societal pressure no? We live in a right handed world after all.

    My parents are a great example of this- both mid 60s but got away with writing left handed at school. My mother worked as a seamstress for years - sewing machines are all set up the same way so no choice there, and at school left handed scissors weren’t a thing. As a result she writes left handed(she’s probably got the nicest handwriting I’ve ever seen a uses an italic fountain pen almost exclusively) but day to day household stuff she’s either fully ambidextrous or right handed if that’s just the way it is.

    My dad left school very young apprenticed as a lorry mechanic, so all hand tools. He later became a manager/boss within the transport industry so was never in a position where he had to use his right hand for anything. He can’t do a fucking thing with his right hand. Now he’s retired he’s a blacksmith and his entire workshop(including the guards on chop saws etc) is set up left handed. Oh, he didn’t learn to write properly until he was in his late teens/early 20s when he decided he needed it to be able to advance in life- he also has astonishingly good handwriting and uses a fountain pen. Both my folks place whatever they’re writing on at 45° to the horizon as it stops them smudging the ink while they write.

    So yeah, I reckon most lefties have a lot of right hand skills but will vary wildly depending on the life they’ve lead.

  • Right everything, but can kick a football with both equally well.

    Edit: that is to say shit with both

  • Given I'm now using my left hand for most things because my right is in a sling, we were just talking about ambidextrousness.

    I'm right-handed in everything except batting sports (cricket, etc) at which point I'm a cack-hander.

    Left foot is my chocolate foot on the bike :)

    Tested either left or right for archery and shot right-handed because there's way more kit available.

    Don't remember being forced to do anything with other hand at school though I have a feeling my cack-handed younger brother was.

  • Wasn't denied my left hand at school as my mum went full bore on me starting school. My grandparents tried it but I always just switched back.

    Pretty sure my dad was forced over by school not parents as a child (caning etc... back then)

    Edit, currently 44 as that's what happens till I turn 45.

  • So much recognise the issues and outcomes here…
    Left-handed but do a lot with my right, like use scissors - because we never had left-handed ones at home. Like others, I think lot of cross-dominance is an adaptation to a right-handed world.
    When I play cricket (terribly) I bowl left handed, but bat right handed. Rounders (no baseball at my school) was bat/bowl left handed though.
    There seems to be a theme where underarm/leg-stuff trends to the right side.
    Use a knife and fork the traditional (right-handed) way, though I couldn’t for any money way tell you which way that is until I sat at a table and picked them up - you wouldn’t want me to set the dinner service!
    Golf I’ve tried both and neither seems natural. Pool and snooker left handed.
    Mouse in my right hand.
    Was never denied my left hand at school but had non-stop remedial handwriting lessons through middle school (45 degree, bent wrist etc) which were absolutely no use and I found it embarrassing to be pulled from class.
    I remember having badminton coaching where various coaches would try to swap my hands - probably because I was awful at both.

  • Fully right-handed here, but left-leg dominant because I mashed up my right knee in a car crash in my early 20s. I also kick a scooter along with my right leg which seems to be the other way round to most righties.

    I work in props/scenery and over the years I’d say at least 50% of the folks I’ve worked with are left handed. Same goes for all the people who have tattooed me- massive overrepresentation of lefties compared the the 1 in 8 or whatever it is in society at large.

    Did my degree in product design and it was well recognised that a far higher percentage of lefties were creative. On my team at Dyson on my work placement at least 50% were left-handed. It’s a thing.

    @edmundro you don’t happen to know a bloke called Jerry De Borg do you? He lives round the corner and works in props and set design, about 60 and has dreads, I know from my special effects days it’s quite a small industry.

  • I don’t personally but I’ve not been in and out of as many workshops as most people in the industry lol.
    My boss can’t walk into any venue or studio without bumping into someone he’s worked with or fallen out with so probably knows him.
    I finally met Pete the Greek last week after hearing the name in hushed whispers for many years.

  • I finally met Pete the Greek last week after hearing the name in hushed whispers for many years.

    Don’t recognise the name but it has been about 15 years now since I worked in the industry!

  • Had a mate at Uni who picked up the guitar

    He picked up our guitars
    He was left handed, but learned to play right handed. He was catching on pretty quick, so tried holding a guitar tuned to be played right handed in the left hand position and swapped between both.

    When he could finally afford his own left handed guitar, he learned in the appropriate position & then thought he may as well finish the set and play it right handed as well

    He’s a pretty decent guitarist who can play either handed on any guitar strung either way.

    Hats off to the lefty

    CSB

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cross dominance - mixed handedness

Posted by Avatar for Gewürzt @Gewürzt

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