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Left-handed or right-handed: this can be determined even before the baby is born

 
, medical expert
Last reviewed: 20.11.2021
 
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09 February 2018, 09:00

A team of specialists from Italy found a technique that allows you to accurately find out who the child will be-the right-handed or the left-handed. And you can do it before the birth of the baby.

Experts examined 29 women at different periods of pregnancy - from 14 to 22 weeks. All women were ultimately scanned : scientists carefully analyzed any movements of the fetus and recorded changes to the video camera.

In the course of the study, scientists were able to assume that, beginning with the eighteenth week of gestation, it is possible to distinguish meaningful and chaotic movements of the unborn child.

The experiment continued. Observations were carried out daily, for 20 minutes for each woman. As a result, it was found that the future baby already on the eighteenth week begins to give preference to any one limb, choosing it for more precise and clear movements. In order to test their assumptions, the specialists met with all the children born when it was 9 years old. The children were examined. All of them already passed school at school, and had a clear definition - right-handed or left-handed. At the same time, scientists noticed that among these children there were no so-called "ambidextres" - people who equally well know the left and right hand.

It was found that in their assumptions, scientists were right to 90%. That is, if during the ultrasound examination the specialists noticed that the baby chose the right or left limb, then after his birth the preference did not change in nine cases out of ten.

Experts are sure: the ultrasonic scanning technique will help not only to determine the child's belonging to the "left-handed-right-hander" principle, but also to predict various diseases or disruptions in development.

Is it really important which hand the child will use more often? Approximately 10% of people on our planet are different from others - they are left-handed. In this case, such a difference is not just a mirror of the movements. In most people, more often using the right hand, the right eye and the right organ of hearing is also leading. In lefties, such combinations are not unique - their brains also have differences, for example, in functional organization. Features of the brain activity of lefties contribute to the development of a creative beginning - so, among the "left-handed" people you can find many outstanding musicians, actors, artists. And recently neurosurgeons managed to find one more difference: brain function after craniocerebral trauma in lefties is restored faster than in "right-handed" patients. Brain features contribute to the launch of compensatory reactions, during which undamaged parts of the brain assume the functions of traumatized areas.

No one is worse or better - neither right-handed nor left-handed. They simply differ from each other - and this needs to be understood and accepted.

Details about the new method can be found on the pages of ScienceAlert.

trusted-source[1], [2], [3]

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