Fluctuating sex hormone levels during the menstrual cycle have been shown to affect functional cerebral asymmetries in cognitive domains. These effects seem to result from the neuromodulatory properties of sex hormones and their metabolites on interhemispheric processing. The present study was carried out to investigate whether functional cerebral…

Adaptive behaviors require preparation and when necessary inhibition or alteration of actions. The right hemisphere has been posited to be dominant for preparatory motor activation. This experiment was designed to learn if there are hemispheric asymmetries in the control of altered plans of actions. Cues, both valid and invalid, which indicate the…

A number of human brain areas showing a larger response to faces than to objects from different categories, or to scrambled faces, have been identified in neuroimaging studies. Depending on the statistical criteria used, the set of areas can be overextended or minimized, both at the local (size of areas) and global (number of areas) levels. Here…

The existence of handedness differences in the retrieval of episodic memories is well-documented, but virtually all have been obtained under conditions of intentional learning. Two experiments are reported that extend the presence of such handedness differences to memory retrieval under conditions of incidental learning. Experiment 1 used Craik…

In motor tasks, subgroups of lefthanders have been shown to differ in the distribution of attention about their own bodies. The present experiment examined whether similar attentional biases also apply when processing observed bodies. Sixteen right handers (RHs), 22 consistent left handers (CLHs) and 11 relatively ambidextrous inconsistent left…

Several studies have shown that handedness has an impact on visual spatial abilities. Here we investigated the effect of laterality on auditory space perception. Participants (33 right-handers, 20 left-handers) completed two tasks of sound localization. In a dark, anechoic, and sound-proof room, sound stimuli (broadband noise) were presented via…

Retrieval of memories is enhanced when bilateral saccades are made immediately before attempting retrieval. One hypothesis is that saccades enhance retrieval by increasing interaction of the brain hemispheres. To test this, subjects viewed arrays of lateralized letters and indicated whether target letters matched either of two probe letters.…

A difference in the perception of extrapersonal space has been shown to exist between dextrals and sinistrals. On the classical line bisection task, this difference is evident in a greater left bias for dextrals compared to sinistrals. Different modalities and regions of space can be affected. However, it has not yet been investigated whether a…

The effects of handedness and saccadic bilateral eye movements on autobiographical recollection were investigated. Recall of autobiographical memories was cued by the use of neutral and emotional words. Autobiographical recollection was assessed by the autobiographical memory questionnaire. Experiment 1 found that mixed-handed (vs. right handed)…

The aim of this study was to determine the influence of sex on hemispheric asymmetry and cooperation in a face recognition task. We used a masked priming paradigm in which the prime stimulus was centrally presented; it could be a bisymmetric face or a hemi-face in which facial information was presented in the left or the right visual field and…

The functional neuroanatomy of tasks that recruit different forms of response selection and inhibition has to our knowledge, never been directly addressed in a single fMRI study using similar stimulus-response paradigms where differences between scanning time and sequence, stimuli, and experimenter instructions were minimized. Twelve right-handed…

Atypical cerebral lateralization in motor and language functions in regard to schizotypal personality traits in healthy populations, as well as among schizophrenic patients, has attracted attention because these traits may represent a risk factor for schizophrenia. Although the relationship between handedness and schizotypal personality has been…

Background/Hypothesis: The degree of attention directed to a stimulus and the presence of anisometric representations can alter the perception of the magnitude of a stimulus. We wanted to learn if normal right-handed subjects' estimates of distance traveled are influenced by the right-left direction or hemispace of movements. Methods: We had…

Research indicates that right-hemisphere mechanisms are specifically sensitive to and averse to risk. Research also indicates that mixed degree of handedness is associated with increased access to right hemisphere processing. Accordingly, it was predicted that mixed-handers would exhibit greater risk aversion. Participants were presented with…

Subjects had to judge the size of a tactile stimulus held in the unseen hand, while a visible phantom hand representing that unseen hand held a tactile stimulus of same or different size. No asymmetries in interference effects were found that could be related to hand or handedness. The method lends itself to quantification of virtual reality box…