世界左撇子日 關于左撇子你不知道的6件事

August 13th is Left Handers' Day and this year, 2014, will mark the 22nd annual celebration. The first celebration took place in 1976 to promote awareness of left handers' and the struggles they face with the day-to-day products catered towards the right-handed predominant population. It has been estimated that up to 10 percent of the world's population are left-handers and even now, many are still discriminated in society for being born that way. Scientists have studied left handers' for a while now to see what differences they boast in comparison to their peers, and here are six surprising discoveries:

2014年8月13號是第22個世界左撇子日。我們生活的世界大多都是為右撇子設計的，而為了引起對左撇子的關注，1976年這個紀念日被首次提出。據統計，世界上現在有10%的人口都是左撇子，然而至今他們中的很多人仍遭受著不公平對待。科學家曾對左右撇子進行研究來辨別彼此有何不同，這里是六個令人驚訝的發現：

1.Left-handers are more likely to develop schizophrenia. A whopping 20 percent of schizophrenics are said to be left-handers, which is a strong proportion considering they only make up 10 percent of the world's population. What's more, being left handed has been associated with mood disorders, ADD and dyslexia.

1. 左撇子更容易精神分裂。據稱，近20%的精神分裂患者都是左撇子。鑒于左撇子僅占全球人口的10%，這個比例是相當大的。而且，左撇子更容易遭受情緒障礙、注意力缺乏癥和閱讀障礙的困擾。

2. Left-handers have a shorter lifespan. It has been quoted, for what seems to be ages, that left-handed people have a shorter life span by nine years than their right-handed peers. This information was shared in the 1980s in two scientific journals -- “Nature” and the “New England Journal of Medicine” -- by psychologists Diane Halpern and Stanley Corenboth. But critics of the study have pointed out that some of the subjects of the study could have been right-handed, since it was common to train a child to use the that hand, and thus, the data was erroneous.

2. 左撇子壽命相對較短。據多年的觀察表明，左撇子平均壽命比右撇子少九年。二十世紀八十年代，這項發現由心理學家黛安·哈普恩和斯坦利·科恩波斯發表在《自然》和《新英格蘭醫學期刊》上。然而評論家指出，這項研究的某些樣本其實是右撇子，因為孩子常被訓練使用右手。因此，該數據是錯誤的。

3. Left-handers do worse on timed exams. It could be because of the right-handed desks in school or awkward sitting positions, but left-handers do worse on timed exams. Lefties, know that you can ask your school for special seating on your exam to accommodate your hand dominance!

3. 左撇子在限時考試時表現較為不好。這可以歸結為學校里的桌椅都是適合右撇子的設計，但是一旦考試限時，左撇子的表現會變得更不好。左撇子們注意了，在學校考試的時候你是可以根據自己需要要求特殊座位的！

4. Left-handers are most scared. You know that lefties suffer from more disorders in the aforementioned point above, but did you know they're twice as likely to suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder? If you're curious why, then know that it is because left-handers have a dominant right brain, which is responsible for the symptoms of PTSD.

4. 左撇子大多膽小。你可能從本文的前半部分知道了左撇子生活有諸多障礙，但是你知道他們比右撇子遭受創傷后應激障礙（PTSD）的概率高一倍嗎？如果你好奇原因的話，那么讓我來告訴你：是右腦主導著左撇子的行為，而這部分大腦正好負責著創傷后應激障礙的癥狀。

5. Left-handers will be worse at languages. The left hemisphere of our brain is responsible for language function, according to Psychology Today, and this is the less dominant hemisphere for lefties. As such, they have less dominance for language.

5. 左撇子語言方面表現更差。根據《今日心理學》，我們的左腦負責語言功能，而左撇子的這半腦發育較不占優，因而語言能力也相對較差。

6. Left-handers are better at certain sports. For instant, in sports where opponents are facing off each other （e.g. boxing, tennis） lefties have an advantage due to the “fighting hypothesis,” which states that lefties are better away to combat their opponent's rightward movement with their dominant left hand.

6. 左撇子在某些運動上表現更好。例如，在和對手面對面的運動項目中（如拳擊、網球）等，基于“戰斗假說”，左撇子們更占優勢。因為他們用左手更能回擊對手右側的行動。