• Question: why are some people left handed and some people right handed? and what does it depend on? also why is most of the population right handed?

    Asked by littlestars to Ed, Hayley, Jason, Nathan, Sophie on 21 Mar 2013.
    • Photo: Sophie Holles

      Sophie Holles answered on 21 Mar 2013:

      We don’t fully understand this yet, but it seems likely that its genetically inherited from a gene from the mother as you are more likely to be left handed if your mother is.

    • Photo: Hayley Evers-King

      Hayley Evers-King answered on 21 Mar 2013:

      There have been some suggestions that it might be to do with the division of work in the brain…but we still don’t really know. One thing they have found though is that even if both your parents are left handed, you still only have a 24% chance of being left handed – this might explain why less of the population is left handed I guess – perhaps the gene combinations that determine it involve recessive genes or combinations that don’t come around very often.

      Interestingly, chimps also appear to be more often right handed just like us!

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