Left-handed people on the increase in the past 100 years, due to


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送交者: Wood 于 2007-09-18, 16:30:36:

the reduction of attempts to force people to write with their right hands.

The number of left-handed people has increased from 3% 100 years ago, to 11% today, according to a study by University College London Psychology Professor Chris McManus. McManus believes the increase is due to the reduction of attempts to force people to write with their right hands.

McManus and his team studied 800 reels of Edwardian film, showing that 16% of people living at the time waved with their left hands, compared to 24% of people today. It also mentioned the difficulty of defining left-handedness. Although as all good QI fans know, just discribing the difference between left and right is difficult.

Some people have claimed that left-handed people suffered severe discrimination in the 18th and 19th centuries. Left-handed people, known as "Gibble-fists", dropped sharply during this time. Victorians forced children to write with their right hands, and some schoolchildren had their left hands tied behind their back to force them to use their right hands back in the 1960s. People are more likely to be left-handed if the mother gives birth in later life, and according to a Swedish study, there is a 30% increase in the chance of a child being left-handed if the mother has an ultrasound scan.

Left-handed people include:
Buzz Aldrin,
Alexander the Great, Bach,
Julius Caesar,
Fidel Castro,
Charlie Chaplin,
Charlemagne,
Prince Charles,
Bill Clinton,
Denis Compton,
Tom Cruise,
John Dillinger,
Robert DiNero,
M.C. Escher,
Henry Ford,
Jimi Hendrix,
Hans Holbein,
Angelina Jolie,
Kermit the Frog,
King Louis XVI,
John McEnroe,
Michelangelo,
Marilyn Monroe,
Ronald Reagan,
Jerry Seinfeld,
Terry-Thomas,
Mark Twain,
Peter Ustinov,
Queen Victoria,
H.G. Wells,
Prince William,
Oprah Winfrey, and I.

Story from The Times

Famous Left-Handers:
http://www.indiana.edu/~primate/left.html#Actors




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