Anxiety more common in left-handed people

Left-handed people are more likely to be fearful

By Liz Lockhart

Recent research has revealed that left-handed people feel more fear than right-handers.

For many centuries myths and legends have sprung up around being left-handed. The devil is usually depicted as being left-handed and the tradition of wearing wedding rings on our left hand started with the Greeks and Romans who wore them to fend off the evil associated with the left hand. Thank goodness we have come a long way since those days!

Many famous people are or/have been left-handed and as a result the stories of left-handers being more artistic or clever have been perpetuated. But, now it seems that being left-handed may coexist with a less attractive characteristic.

This may be because the two sides of the brain perform very different roles. The right hand side of the brain seems to be involved in fear. Left-handed people have the right-hand-side of the brain as the dominant side and it has been suggested that this may account for the higher potential for fear in left-handed people.

In a test which was reported by the Telegraph Sunday, people were asked to watch an eight-minute video clip from ‘Silence of the Lambs’ and recall scenes from the thriller.

The left-handed participants remembered only fragments of the scenes and their descriptions about them were filled with more repetition, showing symptoms of suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Dr. Carolyn Choudhary who led the research at Queen Margaret University in Edinburgh reported that ‘The prevalence of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is almost double in left-handers compared to right-handers.

Choudhary will present the results at the annual conference of the British Psychology Society this week.

We will keep an eye on these and future findings but for now feel that the research is very much in its infancy and a great deal more needs to be done before we can reach any firm conclusions.