Some homebuilt glider designs use sidesticks where pitch is controlled by sliding forward and back
They have a significant loss rate to PIOs on takeoff and often the pilot is lost too
I suspect yokes made their way into private a/c because the marketeers wanted to say it was just like driving a car.
Yokes commonly run through the panel to gears and linkages that descend to under the floor; so, a designer can get rid of a lot of space behind the panel and save a few pounds by putting a stick in front of the seat -- at least with tandem designs.
Side by sticks require more doodads to get to work together, but then transport certification often requires a means to separate the controls if one system jams and we see separate control runs to the actuators.