(updated)
The Left-Handed Struggle in a Right-Handed World
I'm left-handed - by default.
It started with a touchpad.
Being left-handed, I get to use my left on almost all mundane tasks — opening doors, brushing teeth, even carrying bags. But the case in technology -- i use my right hand, most of the time -- touchpad, tapping & single-typing on the smartphone, etc.
However, sitting in a café one afternoon, I found myself absentmindedly clicking with my left hand again on the laptop's touchpad. I’d tried switching the touchpad to left-hand orientation. It felt… slow. Awkward, even.
And when I text? My right thumb dances across my iPhone screen effortlessly. But try as I might, my left hand simply can’t reach those top-corner buttons. It’s as if the phone itself was designed to remind me: “Hey, this isn’t for you.”
That got me thinking: Is technology — the very thing that claims to be inclusive — silently biased against left-handed people?
It's like a pair of scissors, most often than not, the available scissors are for the right handed people, us, left-handed folks are but to settle on what's available, thus, we end up using our right-hand in cutting, until such time that we tend to practice it without difficulty and thus forgetting that the left-hand must do it.
The Science Behind Handedness
According to a 2019 study published in the journal eLife, only about 10.6% of the global population is left-handed. Genetics do play a role, but environment and cultural conditioning are massive influences. In many societies, especially in Asia, left-handedness was discouraged for generations. “Kaliwete ka?” was sometimes said with disapproval, or at the very least, confusion.
In school, left-handed kids are often forced to adapt to right-handed desks. Even the iconic spiral notebooks? A nightmare for the southpaw.
So what happens when you grow up in a world where everything — from scissors to scissors icons — are tailored for right-handed use? You adapt. You compromise. And slowly, your dominant hand gets... co-opted.
Left Hand, Right Tech
Tech, as it turns out, has not been kind to the left-handed community. Smartphones, gaming controllers, camera shutter buttons, even stylus pens — are overwhelmingly designed with right-handed users in mind.
Apple, to its credit, allows left-handed Apple Watch users to rotate the crown and flip the display. But even with that, texting on larger phones with the left hand remains a challenge. A 2022 usability study published by Human-Computer Interaction International noted that “left-handed users require significantly more effort to interact with edge-based UI features.”
And it’s not just discomfort. A 2018 article in Scientific American noted that left-handers are more prone to user error in standard QWERTY interfaces, which can affect everything from typing speed to navigation.
Cultural Conditioning, or Cognitive Rewiring?
It turns out, when you use your non-dominant hand repeatedly, you don’t just build muscle memory — your brain rewires itself. This concept, known as neuroplasticity, suggests that repeated use of the right hand can reduce the dominance of the left hand over time.
Take this anecdote: In an interview with CNN Philippines, Filipino artist Neil Arvin Javier, naturally left-handed, revealed that he learned to sketch using his right hand in school because left-handed desks were scarce. Now he paints with both — but feels more "fluent" with the right.
Left-handed scissors? Rare. Ergonomic left-handed mouse? Expensive. Ambidextrous tools? Often not truly neutral. And so, the cycle continues: left-handers adapt — not because they choose to, but because the world gives them no choice.
Adaptation or Erasure?
So what does it mean when you’re born left-handed but live your life right-handed?
For many, it's not just an ergonomic issue. It’s an identity one. A slow, unintentional erasure of what once made you different — all for the sake of convenience.
And maybe that’s why, every now and then, you reach for the touchpad with your left hand again. A silent protest. A subtle nod to the child who once tried to cut paper with the wrong scissors and still believed that was okay.
Making Space for the Left
It’s easy to dismiss handedness as trivial. But if you’ve ever struggled to write on a whiteboard, or smudged your own pen ink, or flipped a kitchen tool around — you know it’s not.
Design inclusivity isn’t just about adding features. It’s about acknowledging experiences. And in this increasingly digital world, where accessibility is a buzzword and personalization is a promise, maybe it’s time we build for both hands. Equally.
So here’s to the left-handed clickers, texters, sketchers, and coders — adapting every day in a world built for someone else’s ease.
May you never forget which hand taught you to persevere.
~Mac
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