Are you Left-Handed?

[Dylsexlic]

I would like to know if any left-handed pilots have difficulty adapting to aircraft without the usual control column or stick.

I'm referring particularly to Airbus aircraft, but I am also interested to know if it is, or is not an issue in general for pilots.

Of course I'm opening up the field for all the usual pprune jokers, and I don't want to spoil your fun :ok: , but this is a serious request for some work that is being done into right / left handedness by a research grad at uni.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts and experiences.

If I can find out how to add a poll / vote then I'll post again. The checkbox mentioned in the FAQ doesn't appear as an option when I post. :confused:

[FLCH]

I'm a leftie, but have been flying in the right seat for a long time ('bout 18 years all told), I got put in the left seat during a sim ride I felt pretty uncomfortable for a while as I wanted to cross my hands... however being in the right seat makes it very easy for me to type on the FMC and use the flight guidance. I also heard (5th hand) that about 30% of pilots are lefties. but have no data to back it up, but have seen more than my fair share of lefties in my time at work. By the way Mrs.FLCH is a leftie too, but my kid is a rightie, does that mean he belongs to the milkman ??

[Helli-Gurl]

I'm a leftie to, buthad it drummed out of me at school...went to one of those prim and proper all girl schools.....ahhh the joys of a collonial education!

x

[Rainboe]

Quite right! You can hear a Miss Brodie type chanting loudly: "Colonic Irrigations will continue until we learn to use the Right hand!" (that's why it's called 'the RIGHT hand'). The world deemed it plus (try using scissors with the left hand!- but you'd know that already).

Left handers!- another one for someone to add to my list of alleged 'dislikes'! My first wife was a leftie- wonder where she is now?

[Helli-Gurl]

Please don't tell me she's under your patio Rainboe! ;)

xx

[paulc]

throw left handed, write right handed (but can manage with left), racket sports with either, archery either hand.

How about right or left leg when it comes to football (right for me) or which eye do you put to a camera viewfinder.(left for me)

[cortilla]

was ambidextrous till about 6 when my teacher tried to force me to be a rightie, so stubborn as an ass that i am i went full leftie.

Left handed
right footed
left eyed
wear watch as a rightie (take it off for writing tho)
eat with knife and fork as a rightie.

There is a higher proportion of left handed pilots (than in the general public which is about 6-7%) whearas pilots about 25%

The latin for left is sinistre (or something similar), we cakhanders weren't much liked in ancient rome.

Lefties die on average 7-9 years younger than righties.

Panda bears are left handed (pawed)

There is a tribe in the amazon where the population is 40% left handed.

Famous lefties include
Neil Armstrong and Buzz aldrin
Marie Curie and Albert Einstein
And from the way he killed his victims, Jack the ripper just have a look at this

link (http://www.anythingleft-handed.co.uk/fam_history.html)

for some very famous and interesting people

[Dylsexlic]

Several people have already mentioned that there are statistically a higher percentage of left-handed pilots than the average occupation has.

Left Handers are supposed to have an enhanced spatial awareness capability. A bit like a sixth sense EGPWS I suppose, without the jolly announcements!

Do you think this makes them more likely candidates for a flying career?

[cyclicmicky]

I had a day at Wattisham last year, and talked to a couple of pilots who were training on the Apache.
Although this has nothing to do with left or right hand abilities, it was interesting to hear then speak about wearing a hemet with a head-up monocle lens over one eye and nothing over the other.

Try holding your hand in front of your right eye with something written on it, and read it- at the same time as focusing on something in the distance and you will see what I mean.
According to the military the visual differences are usually overcome after a time period, proving that they actually become capable of focusing both eyes differentially with the helmet on and yet normally without the helmet.
Amazing thing the human body isn't it!!:ok:

[PT6ER]

I'm a lefty for writing and computer usage (having the mouse on the left kept unwanted users off my computer whilst working in Indonesia), all be it mixed up since I play racket and bat sports right handed.

I'd give my right arm to be ambidexterous ......

(sorry about the spelling):p

[Topslide6]

Interesting question this one. :=

I've never got it to tell you the truth...you never seem to get right handed pilots asking this question.

As far as flying goes I don't understand why it's a factor. We have to be able to fly equally well with both hands, dependent upon which seat you sit in.

You spend all your training sitting in the left seat flying with your left hand and your right on the throttles. Your first job is then the other way round, flying with the right with the left on the throttles.

I found it funny at the initial class one on the old EEG when the nurse could tell whether or not you were right or left handed just from the test. For the record i'm predominently right handed but play golf and cricket left handed. I play tennis right handed though. :confused: Who knows why?!

As Lee Evens once said,

I'm ambidexterous. I can do f**k all with both hands! :D

[TheOddOne]

i am left-handed.

I first learned to fly with a right stick and left throttle (some would say the 'proper' way to fly). Then I did the 'conventional' flying - control wheel & engine controls in the middle. I had no problem converting.

A little while ago, I had the opportunity to fly a Beagle Pup, a delightful aircraft I wish I'd encountered years ago. That was left stick, right throttle. Again, no problem converting.

I've spent over 35 years driving in the right seat of a car, only relatively recently did I drive for the first time on the other side. Again, no problem. Indeed, only once in several thousand of miles touring in Europe in a right-hand drive car did I have a moment's lapse of concentration and drive on the wrong side. Fortunately there was no-one else around.

I'm surprised about the 25% statistic. I consider myself quite versatile when it comes to handedness. I'd put this down to it being a right-handed world and us lefties just have to be more adaptable to survive, but maybe there's more to it than that! We're definitely more artistic, I think about 50% of great architects and painters are left-handed. Perhaps that's a part of the spatial awareness thing.

I'm quite proud of my 'difference', not ashamed or shy about it. It's nice to encounter others and it's a crime that it's ever beaten out of people. Helli-gurl, I feel for you.

I do prefer to use a mouse with the left hand, am doing so at the moment. Howeve, it's no problem to sit down and use the right hand if that's how the previous user has left it.

Most right-handed people are simply quite useless at adapting. I'm often asked to do tasks that require using the left hand by righties who can't cope, yet we're expected to manage the other way around.

I have no idea how it arises. My first wife was also a leftie, but our son is firmly right-handed. My present wife is right-handed, as are our 2 children. Ho hum.

More interesting facts & figures, please.

Cheers,
TheOddOne

[retard-retard]

I visit full mo sims regularly and most recently flew a VS346 at gecat and was terrified at the prospect of flying the stick with my left hand (same sort of problem just reversed.)

However, I was totally amazed at the abilty to switch with no thought at all including commanding the throttles with a hand that is more used to orbiting a stick base :D

The F/O who was in with me on the sim showed me my approach analysis and said an instrument rating would be more than achieved from the resulting data.

It seems that when it actually comes to the crunch your brain takes over rather than your dexterity.

I flew in all weathers and found it to be an incredibley enlightening experience.

But just maybe that's the aircraft rather than the driver?

Mark.

[Old Smokey]

I'm sorry Dylsexlic, but I don't think that this is an issue for pilots. I'm a Right hander, and with the curious exception of peeling oranges and dealing cards with my Left hand, suffer horrendous problems out of the cockpit when having to use Leftie's equipment, e.g. a friend's computer with a mouse on the left. Aircraft require the use of both hands, i.e. one on the Stick / wheel, and the other on the throttle, and pilots quickly learn to become co-ordinated in the simultaneous use of both hands. They are not 'handed'.

My personal experience covers centre stick (tandem aircraft), and side stick and control wheel flown from both the Left and Right seats. The only factor to adjust to when changing seats (and thus changing over the Left hand / Right hand function) was the quite significant difference in visual perception upon changing seats, but even that is fairly quickly overcome.

That's my own personal experience, but my observation as an instructor in taking a Left seater from elsewhere for Airline entry into the Right seat, or a Right seater F/O and training him / her for command in the Left seat, the time to adjust to the different visual perspective is quite short, with absolutely no discernible difference between Left and Right handers.

If there is a difference, it seems to be well overcome by pilots applying cognitive thought to the process of flying, as opposed to the knee jerk intuitive reaction. I think other posters have made the same remark.

As an item of trivia, I was once told by a Left handed tennis coach that Lefties enjoy about a thousandth of a second faster reaction time advantage over their Right handed colleagues, due to the slightly shorter nerve path from the Left Arm / Hand to the brain.

Not taking any cheap shots here Dylsexlic, but your call sign leads me to ponder whether you are compounding the Left / Right issue with dyslexia, and that IS a very significant problem with aviation.

Regards,

Old Smokey

[Dylsexlic]

Some good points in your post, Old Smokey. Thanks for taking the time to articulate them.

I took a while to adjust to using my right hand on the A320 stick. As I mentioned elsewhere, it's my fine motor control that is not as well developed. It doesn't make any difference ony any other aircraft type that doesn't utilise the same system.

I'm probably unusual in that I am practically completely left handed except for cricket (batting) and golf (appalling). No idea why.

As for Dylsexlic as my callsign - no offence intended to anyone - that's just an excuse for bad spelling! :hmm:

[BOAC]

I don't see it as a problem - it just takes getting used to!

Those WIWOLs amongst us who have flown radar intercepts in the RHS of the old beastie will be used to twiddling the 23 functions on the radar control stick with either hand - ambidextrose, as they say - speaking as an old sweetie!

Now, where it REALLY was interesting was in 'instinctive' movements of each hand in formation and air-to-air refuelling:eek: :eek:

[Old Smokey]

An addendum to my earlier response Dylsexlic, there is a very significant difference between instinctive and intuitive response. An instinctive response is to blink when something is coming towards one's eye, it's not learned. I would think that Left / Right handedness leans towards instinctive response, that is, we are born with a propensity to favour one hand over the other.

An intuitive response is one that is learned from exposure and experience until it becomes "second nature", for example in the UK we look intuitively to the right before crossing the road, whereas in the USA we intuitively look to the left before doing so (in Holland we look every bleedin' where for bicycles). We are not born with intuition. As mankind was not born to fly, we learn the appropriate responses required to fly an aeroplane until they become second nature, the hand that is used is not a consideration. Undoubtedly we do have more refined motor control with our "favoured" hand, but as mentioned earlier, the cognitive thought process seems to overcome intuitive hand use.

OK, amatuer psychiatrists hat off, back to technical stuff.

Good luck with the research.

Old Smokey

[BOAC]

As mankind was not born to fly, we learn the appropriate responses required to fly an aeroplane until they become second nature, the hand that is used is not a consideration. Undoubtedly we do have more refined motor control with our "favoured" hand, but as mentioned earlier, the cognitive thought process seems to overcome intuitive hand use.- that is OK for 'routine' type flying, OS, and if you ONLY fly with one layout, but as I said, if you try something like line astern formation, it is amazing how strong the 'intuitive' movement with the right hand (push forward on the stick) can be while closing too fast on your leader.......which.................opens the throttles, and then as you get even closer, the 'intuitive' action of the left hand (close the throttles) translates neatly into......pull back on the stick with INTERESTING results :D

[barit1]

I have heard the real early Sikorsky R-4 helo had a single collective stick between the side-by-side seats, meaning you had to reverse right and left hand reflexes if you switched seats. No SAS either.

The result was that very few pilots who trained on one side were able to transition to the other side.

[MkVIII]

It's all a matter of conditioning, and intuitive motion.

I myself am quite ambidextrous (except my left handed writing is not particularly good). I am also left eye dominant, so most visual task are preferred with my LEFT eye -converse to what is normal for a right handed person.

If you are similarly ambidextrous, transitioning and readjustment to a "foreign" cockpit layout is genuinely not a problem. For instance, I learnt to fly on Piper Tomahawks - conventional layout - yoke in left hand, throttle in right hand. I then did a LOT of flying in the DeHavilland Tiger Moth, where the throttle is on the LEFT, and the stick in between your legs. You flew with your RIGHT hand, and throttle in your left hand. I found NO PROBLEM adjusting to it whatsoever - if anything, it was INCREDIBLY natural (I am sure all pilots would find this, especially fighter pilots that still have this layout today).

I similarly have NO difficulty whatsoever with the side stick ala Airbus. It's just as natural as a yoke, or even a centre stick ala Tiger Moth.

So, I honestly do not believe that a lefty should have any trouble in any cockpit layout to be perfectly honest, unless he/she had potentially poor pshychomotor skills / coordination.

[John Farley]

Cyclic

Check your PMs

Regards

JF

[Skeeter Pilot]

I'm left handed. Can get by without too much problem using right and in a lot of cases equally as well.

No problem flying fixed wing from either side. Learnt rotary on a Schwiezer 300, sit on left with anti-clockwise rotors then went on to Skeeter, sit on right with clockwise rotors. No probs.

Can pirouet r/c model heli to right better than left but righties have same problem....explain that one.

[MkVIII]

Better question is can ANYONE explain helicopters???

:p

[Old Smokey]

MkVIII,

Yes, they can be explained, but it's getting a bit off topic.

Helicopters are so ugly that the earth repels them. They don't use the conventional laws of aerodynamics.

Happy Easter,

Old Smokey

[john_tullamarine]

This all explains a great deal to me .. although I'm not quite sure just what .... and, like many, I do this with the left and that with the right and, at times, haven't a clue as to just what I am doing ...

OS .. I trust that you are a bridge devotee ? .. likewise I deal from the left.

.. and I must admit to a perversion .. having first left the surface in a helo as a youngster ... but never having qualified in rotary .. I still think that helos are wonderful things ... a bit like Tiggers.

JT

[Hobo]

Interesting stuff.

I am right handed for everything except when playing cards; when dealing I hold the pack in my right hand and use the left to share the cards out. Having been dealt a hand I sort them into order in my left hand using the right hand to sort them and then transfer them to my right hand to hold, actually playing the cards with my left.

I learnt to fly on the Chipmunk which as far as I can remember had the throttle on the left, then various Pipers from the left hand seat. Then left and right seats of 707s and 737s. Never had any problem adjusting.

My golfing pal is left handed for everything including tennis. But he plays cricket and golf righthanded.

My writing is very untidy and "spidery" in spite of my best efforts. I have heard that this is quite common in people who write righthanded but have some left handed traits. This applies to my son as well.

[duece19]

I´m a leftie...

never found any problems within the actual handling bit, but quite a few of my colleagues are amazed at the fact.

"Are u left handed" (with a seriously amazed voice)
Surely they must have met one or two lefthanded persons before.

Another good one

"How does it feel to be lefthanded"
Dunno, sort of used to it ya know.


I write with both hands, but only tend to use my left hand anyway, run the computer mouse with my right to avoid changing every its position every flippin time.

What irritates me is my inability to use right hand siccors, I just can cut a straight line with ´em.

[Old Smokey]

This thread has taken some interesting, oft light-hearted twists and turns. Now we have 3 "Righties" who deal cards with their Left hands. Hmmm....maybe there's some university somewhere who can give a research grant into this phenomenom. Are there any "Lefties" out there who deal cards with their Right hand ? If so, we can put up a good case for that grant. John_T, No, I don't play bridge, actually I prefer to deal cards under the table (with my Left hand of course), but this is not generally recommended if one wishes to lead a long life.

Thus far we've covered "Laterality" pretty well, how about "Verticality"? Here's a (totally truthful) one out of Left field, my aunt could ONLY write Upside Down, that is, from the bottom of the page to the top with inverted writing (with her right hand). Her writing was perfectly legible.

Hobo, your untidy and "spidery" writing sounds much like that which occurs when a natural Left hander has it thumped out of him / her at school and forced to use their Right hand. Several teachers have made this remark to me.

,sdrageR

yekomS dlO

[Hobo]

Old Smokey No, I naturally wanted to write with my right hand as far as I can remember. My son who has the same trait certainly wasn't forced to write with his right hand. Trying to do anything lefthanded (apart from cards) just seems unnatural to me.

On a slightly different tack a tailor once told me that right handed people tend to "dress" to the left and vice versa. Any research on that?!

[john_tullamarine]

... I should be so lucky as to be so well endowed to have to worry about such detail ... maybe that is the underlying reason I have two bob each way on the left and right handed thing ?

[MkVIII]

JT, that's just TOO MUCH info on a purely need to know basis, and I didn't need to know!!!!!!!!!! :p

Ambidextrosity (???) is a wonderful, uselful thing!

[cyclicmicky]

Hi John,
tried to Pm you but unfortunately your inbox is a bit chokker.
Will try again soon.
Regards
Micky
:{

[John Farley]

Cyclic

Sorry - I boobed - I thought I had emptied it but did not have the inbox start date set back far enough. Should be OK now.

John