PLEASE NOTE: This isn't for any formal research, but I AM gathering information to form some hypotheses. I'd greatly appreciate your input. AD/HDers only please answer, not parents unless you have the disorder yourself.

Left-Handed: You do almost everything with primarily your left hand: writing, throwing, etc.

Right-Handed: Do almost everything with your right hand.

Ambidextrous: You can do most things with either hand.

Hemispherically Ambivalent: You cannot switch, but you do some things with your left hand and some with your right hand.

Other: Please explain in a post that you marked "other" and why.

Thanks for your help!!

I put down Hemispherically ambivalent. I write with my right hand, but perform other tasks with my left hand.

I'm right-handed, definitely, but have learned to mouse with my left and now switch off. I did this to take the load off my right.

BTW, I did a lit. review maybe ten years ago on left-handedness and health/longevity.

Seems that the left-handers didn't seem to live as long as right-handers, but I assumed this was due to a cohort effect. Left-handers were forced to use their right hand to write in US schools up until the 1960s.

So older people who were initially left-handed would identify as right-handers, reducing the apparant proportion of left-handers in older age groups v younger age groups.

Or, who knows, being forced to use your right hand when you're left-handed may put an individual at a slight disadvantage and increase general life stress and risk for injury.

I'm right-handed but I can write with my left hand, just not as quickly. I used to take notes in class sometimes with my left hand when I was bored. It slowed me down enough that I didn't drift off as much. The funny thing is, that since I write so fast with my right hand, the notes I take with my left hand are ussually more legible.

I put down Hemispherically ambivalent. I write with my right hand, but perform other tasks with my left hand.

Quick question Unleash, do you write with your right hand because you were forced to in school? My brother is ENTIRELY left-handed, but was forced to write with his right.

Oh, and do you eat with your left?

BTW, I did a lit. review maybe ten years ago on left-handedness and health/longevity. **interesting stuff deleted**

Hmmmm. Very interesting!

I write with my right naturally, but do other things with my left.

I am very spatially adept, so can switch, but opposite the usual is slower.

I am primarily right handed, but I also can write and eat, etc with my left (just not as fluent as with my right). So, I picked "other" due to lack of complete fluency with my left.

I chose "ambidextrous" because I use both hands to do just about everything, and I'm not sure if "hemispherically ambivalent" refers to the brain or the hands.

I can write with my left hand, but I write better with my right hand. I definately draw with the right hand. When I reach for things, it's equally with the left or right hand. I talk on the phone with my left hand, primarily. When I was a youngster, I did cartwheels starting with my left hand. I couldn't do it starting with the right for some reason. I throw darts with my right hand.

So what's my correct label?

I was a bartender for a little bit during college so it helped tremendously to be ambidextrous! However, my short-term memory was horrible so I kept forgetting everyone's orders!

I can write with my left hand, but I write better with my right hand. I definately draw with the right hand. When I reach for things, it's equally with the left or right hand. I talk on the phone with my left hand, primarily. When I was a youngster, I did cartwheels starting with my left hand. I couldn't do it starting with the right for some reason. I throw darts with my right hand.

So what's my correct label?

I was a bartender for a little bit during college so it helped tremendously to be ambidextrous! However, my short-term memory was horrible so I kept forgetting everyone's orders!
LOL!

I'd probably call you ambivalent simply because there are so many things you can't switch on. You're kind of all over the place! I'm hemispherically ambivalent, too, but CANNOT switch on ANYTHING, and you can pretty much divide the sides by fine motor tasks and gross motor tasks. I write, eat, cut (fine) left-handed. I throw, bat, cartwheel (gross) right-handed.

I am glad I read your post before I responded, I do write with my right hand but some things like crocheting I do left handed. My mother was left handed and I did as she did literally!!!!

I can eat with either hand and if I am really hungry I my be caught eating with both!!!!!

When I apply make up I apply the right side of my face with the right hand and the left with my left. I found that my arm got in the way when trying to apply make-up to the left side of my face with my right. Silly I know but that was the way I did it.

I used to do more with my left until the nerves were damaged from a falling shelf. Working with Gary in the pallet business full time I began rehabbing my left more than the actual medical rehabilitation.

The nail gun is heavy probably 8-10 pounds with a recoil following each discharge of a nail (125 psi). I can go through 300 nails quickly (15 mins) when in a hurry. Several hours of that activity my wrist and elbow began burning (not good) so I would switch and give my right hand a break!!!!

I will use my left hand to do activities I learned from left handed people, to prevent repeatitation injuries, and avoid having to figure out how to get eye-liner on my left eye with my arm between my eyes and the mirror!!!!!!

I can lead with my left or right foot when lifting, jumping or kicking. Depends on which one is "handy".

I have been told by eye doctors I am left eyed????? What ever that means?????

I can write left handed but it messes with my dyslexia, and it does not improve my spelling at bit. As a matter of fact it makes it harder to get the letters and words in order!!! Hard to explain but I feel like I have to access a different part of my brain when I try to write left handed. Not the part with the hand the language part has to re-route????? Beats me but I can adjust to the coordination aspect easier than adjusting to maintain the same sentence and letter structure.

Maybe if I stood on my head and tried writing with my left hand I wouldn’t need two spell checkers to write an intelligible sentence!!!!! :rolleyes:

I'm mostly right handed, but there are many things that I tend to do with my left (eat, drive, etc).

Quick question Unleash, do you write with your right hand because you were forced to in school? My brother is ENTIRELY left-handed, but was forced to write with his right.
No, I've always written right-handed. My school never forced people to change.

Oh, and do you eat with your left?[/QUOTE]
Usually whichever hand is free at the time. I think I prefer my right hand for that though.

Ambidexterous.
I write my school/class/work analytical papers with my right hand
When I assemble products from a manual, I use my right hand
I cut food with my left hand
I write my poetry with my left hand
I pick the Classical guitar notes with my left hand
I eat with my right hand


When I was younger, I was also forced to write with my right hand..being that the left hand was viewed as the 'Devil's' work...at St. Thomas Moore's Elementary back in Baton, LA...
If you've ever attended Catholic school...everything seemed to be the work of Mr. Lucifer at one time or another..otherwise they wouldn't stay in business, in my opinion... (0:

When I took classical guitar lessons, my Granmere had enough of their rhetoric, and she had my guitar strings strung on backwards..so I would pick the strings with my left hand, in lieu of my right, as most do. I couldn't do it the 'normal' way, and would've failed the lessons.

My Granmere, took my guitar to a local music store, and had the guitar revised slightly, to accomodate my needs.
It threw off the equilibrium of the music teacher for a while until she came to 'balance' with it. (0:

I never stopped utilizing the use of both hands away from school.
It's neither better or worse than someone who is right or left handed, just once again, different.
Nova

Nova

I have been told by eye doctors I am left eyed????? What ever that means?????


A way to tell which "eyed" you are:

Hold your finger in front of you at arm's length. Look beyond your finger at a vertical line in the background (corners where walls meet are good for this). Lie up your finger so that the line is between the two fingers you now see (you're focused on the line).

Now, close your right eye w/o moving your finger and note where your finger is in relation to the line. Then open your right eye and close your left. Which eye, when open, shows the finger on the line? If not on the line, which shows it closer to the line?

This is how I know I'm entirely ambivalent; my finger is the same distance from the line on either side.

This is a small, biased sample, so conclusions cannot be drawn here, but results so far are interesting.

In the general population, when you force the choice to either left or right, there is a 10/90 distribution. 10% are left-handers.

Here, at the time I'm posting this, the distribution is:

left 13.89 right 44.44 ambidextrous
13.89 ambivalent 25 other 2.78
Even if you distribute the A/A/O answers in a 10/90 manner (the most conservative way I can think of), we see a distribution of lefties that is nearly twice the general population: Left = 18%, Right 82%.

There could be a number of reasons for this link (if it truly is linked), but it has some interesting implications.

I talk on the phone with my left hand, primarily.
I use my left hand for the phone too, although I'm otherwise right-handed, but I think this is because I'm "left-eared." It feels bizarre to put the phone up to my right ear, and I think I turn to my left to listen, but I'm not sure. I'll even hold the phone to my left ear with my right hand, but generally, that's too awkward.

(A while back, someone had a thread for identifying your dominant hand, foot, ear and eye, so that's where I got the concept of "left ear" from.)

I'm right handed but my ADHD daughter is pretty much a mixed bag. We finally had to select a hand for her to use because she kept going back and forth. So she writes right handed, but sometimes eats and does other things left handed -- don't know if we picked correctly or not?

Scattered

Baaaarbie! :D

I voted ambivalent because I tend to reach with left as often as right and do my poker chip tricks with left and can't do them at all with the right.

Appt tomorrow... if I don't get my Dx, you'll have to delete me I guess.
I'd have waited to vote, but well... I'm patient. :p

I selected "other". I'm generally right handed, right footed (as in using my right leg to kick and my left to stand, for example) and right eyed (I always use my right eye to look down a microscope), however: I always open bottles (regardless of whether they have a cap or a cork) with my left, and drive with my left. If I'm using a fork and a knife at the same time, I cut with my right and eat with the fork in my left hand. I wouldn't have noticed if my family hadn't pointed out that it looked goofy...

Then open your right eye and close your left. Which eye, when open, shows the finger on the line? If not on the line, which shows it closer to the line

I'm "off" either way, when my left eye is open my finger is very slightly closer but not by much. I wouldn't have noticed my finger was any closer either way if we didn't have vertical lines in the paneling. The difference is very minimal. So I am "off" not matter what I do!!!! :eek:

Sounds about right...story of my life "off the line"!!!!!! ;)

I'm totally left-handed all the way and I love it! Bowl, bat, throw, eat, anything and everything, and I'm apparently left-eyed as well. I do hold the phone in my right hand (and right ear), but I guess that's so my left hand is free to do everything else.

I do stuff with either hand for most common stuff, like opening bottles or grabbing things, putting pieces of something together, using tools and like that.

Major stuff, like playing the guitar or swinging a bat or writing, I usually do with one hand or the other, and it’s usually whatever fits best with the righty world. But if I concentrate I can switch, after maybe a week of effort. It’s not usually worth it, though, so I don’t bother.

I wrote randomly either way until about second grade. That was no fun, because I really didn’t care, and consequently didn’t pay attention. And consequently got yelled at, and so on; the usual stuff.

I finally got it straight when I realized that it was supposed to be hard to do wrong; the kid next to me leaned over after I got yelled at, and asked how the heck I could write backwards like that. After that, for some reason, it made sense to me why they made such a fuss. I think I did it their way after that just to keep the other kids from feeling bad that they couldn’t do it.

I am ambitdextrous and can do everything with both hands. my writing is better with my left because i use it the most!

Then open your right eye and close your left. Which eye, when open, shows the finger on the line? If not on the line, which shows it closer to the line.

ARGHHH! I can't do it! If I focus my sight on the line then I see two fingers. If I focus on my finger, then I see two lines. :confused:

Then open your right eye and close your left. Which eye, when open, shows the finger on the line? If not on the line, which shows it closer to the line.

ARGHHH! I can't do it! If I focus my sight on the line then I see two fingers. If I focus on my finger, then I see two lines. :confused:
Stay focused on the line. When you close one eye, you'll only see one finger.

Thank you to all who've voted so far.

60 people and only half are right-handed. Funny, though, there are more hemispherically ambivalent than lefties.

A way to tell which "eyed" you are:

Lie up your finger so that the line is between the two fingers you now see (you're focused on the line).

Now, close your right eye w/o moving your finger and note where your finger is in relation to the line. Then open your right eye and close your left. Which eye, when open, shows the finger on the line? If not on the line, which shows it closer to the line?
When I close one eye or the other the "two" fingers stay in the same place - I just see one at a time. So they're obviously the same distance from the line, because I lined them up that way at the beginning.

What you have to do is hold two fingers out and line it up so that the line is between the two fingers. You'll proabably see three or four fingers (since your focusing on the line) but just do whatever looks the most right to you without thinking too much. Then close one eye and then the other and see what happens.

My natural tendency is to go with my right eye.

When I close one eye or the other the "two" fingers stay in the same place - I just see one at a time. So they're obviously the same distance from the line, because I lined them up that way at the beginning.
You're focusing on the finger, not the line.


What you have to do is hold two fingers out and line it up so that the line is between the two fingers. You'll proabably see three or four fingers (since your focusing on the line)
Bingo. You should only see 2 fingers, though. Any more and I'd have my eyes checked.

You should only see 2 fingers, though. Any more and I'd have my eyes checked.

That or try the exercise BEFORE the mixed drinks...my meds are officially gone must be bed time!!!!!!!:)

I marked other even though I'm mostly right handed. But I swing bats and golf clubs left handed. Its because my neighbor who was left handed taught me to swing a bat.

I'm right-handed primarily, but i use my left hand for eating and drinking... nothing else.

OK I'm Right handed but left eyed and left footed. I can do somethings with my left hand but my right is definately dominant. I'm like a frankenstien LOL

I use my left hand to write, but will shot a gun with my right hand along with shot a basketball with my right hand. It seems that when I do something that requires using my eyes to find that right spor I tend to use my right hand. When I golf, though, I still use my left for that