title: The influences of handedness, sex, familial sinistrality and androgyny on language laterality, verbal ability, and spatial ability.
abstract: This study assessed possible influences of handedness, sex, familial sinistrality (FS), and self-rated androgyny on language laterality and on spatial and verbal test performances of 225 right-handers and 134 left-handers. Left-handers and right-handers performed differently on all tasks. Right-handers were significantly more lateralized on the language laterality task and were superior to left-handers on the spatial visualization task. Left-handers obtained slightly, but significantly, higher vocabulary scores. Androgyny had a significant main effect on spatial ability, the more androgynous subjects being superior. Androgyny also interacted with sex and FS factors on the spatial task. All in all, present result are consistent with the conclusion that each of the subject factors studied may prove to be of some relevance for a complete understanding of laterality and cognitive ability patterns.
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D004007:Dichotic Listening Tests; D004292:Dominance, Cerebral / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality; D005783:Gender Identity; D005824:Genetics, Behavioral; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D008297:Male; D012727:Sex Characteristics; D013028:Space Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D014705:Verbal Behavior / Q000502:physiology*