Inverted Left Handers - Pres. Obama & Prince William

Patti wrote:...

I noticed a while back that Obama was an inverted left hander, but I didn't realize Prince William was an inverted left hander until you posted the picture of him writing in another thread!

Patti, here are a few other famous 'inverted' left handers:

(PS. I will respond to your other points at a later moment)


- Bill Gates (IQ estimated at 160):




- former US president candidate John McCain (IQ estimated at 133):




- former US president Gerald Ford (IQ estimated at 121):




- actress Angelina Jolie (IQ estimated at 122/136):




- Benjamin Netanyahu (IQ estimated at 180), prime minister of Israel:




Sources for the IQ scores:
http://www.kids-iq-tests.com/famous2.html
http://www.kids-iq-tests.com/r-prez.html

Patti wrote:Nice collection!
I wouldn't include Angelina as she is writing under her writing rather than over the top. Bill Gates, I'd need to see another image of him writing to be sure. He's not crooking his wrist at all and I'm not sure if he's writing over the top or coming in from the side.

Interestingly the studies showed that with about 1/3 of the participants it was undecided whether they were inverted or non-inverted. I would guess this would mean that they matched some criteria for being inverted, but not others.

Yes Patti, I understand what you mean regarding that photo first photo of Angelina - but I had found a few other photos which indicate that she can be counted as an 'inverted writer': because I think in all photos she 'points' the ballpoint likewise towards her self (and not away of herself).

I think most of the photos illustrate my observation.

Do you observe that as well?

Martijn (admin) wrote:

Patti wrote:Nice collection!
I wouldn't include Angelina as she is writing under her writing rather than over the top. Bill Gates, I'd need to see another image of him writing to be sure. He's not crooking his wrist at all and I'm not sure if he's writing over the top or coming in from the side.

Interestingly the studies showed that with about 1/3 of the participants it was undecided whether they were inverted or non-inverted. I would guess this would mean that they matched some criteria for being inverted, but not others.

Yes Patti, I understand what you mean regarding that photo first photo of Angelina - but I had found a few other photos which indicate that she can be counted as an 'inverted writer': because I think in all photos she 'points' the ballpoint likewise towards her self (and not away of herself).

I think most of the photos illustrate my observation.

Do you observe that as well?

From Patti - Here it looks like her wrist is curved around somewhat, but you can see she is not writing over the top of her writing. See the dark letter just over her knuckles? She is writing toward herself - maybe that's a whole different style of its own.

From Patti - This looks normal

From Patti - This is also questionable.

From Patti - Looks normal.

From Patti - Wrist is actually bending back rather than curling over the top of the writing.

Patti wrote:
She does have an interesting writing style, but I don't think it's inverted. See comments between photos.

Well, my thought is that I think there are two 'inverted' writing styles which are both resulting in that the pencil is facing the bottom of the page:

1) The 'hooked' variant, where the wrist is bended inwards (as seen in the picture below).



2) The 'fist' variant, where the fingers are bended inwards - like in making a fist (as seen in the picture below), and instead of the hooked-wrist (as seen in the first variant) this variant is typically featured with a hooked-elbow.




I recognize how the posture of Angelina's hand relates to this second variant - because my natural writing is related as well - though more like Angelina's posture, and not like in the picture above.

But I always write with my pencil 'inverted' (= directed to myself)... and definitely not in the posture as seen in the 3th example below - which is described as the 'normal' variant because the pencil is directed away from the person.

So, despite that I observe that Angelina's hand sometimes appears to be below the written words... her pencil appears to be pointed towards herself as well.

So I see the difference between Angelina's postured when we compare it with for example Obama, McCain & Netanyahu, because these three men are obviously using the first of the two 'inverted' variants.


However, I also see a clear difference between both variants with the 'normal' writing variant.... when the pencil pointed at the top of the page, as seen in the picture below. So therefore I can not describe Angelina's writing style as just normal.




Finally, one more thought:

Maybe her writing posture belongs to the 'doubtful' category, but despite that I was able to describe 2 'inverted' variants myself ... unfortunately it appears that other researchers never really bothered about those details.

And I haven't seen any detailed definition of what 'inverted writing' really is; the most detailed definition that I have seen so far is the following:

http://molly.kalafut.org/lefthanded/lefthanded.html

"Some left-handers write with their pencil facing the bottom of the page, in a "hooked" position. This is called inverted writing."

Patti wrote:The reason I think it's called inverted writing is because technically they are writing upsidedown.

Patti wrote:...

Have you seen any statistics on females? In my experience I notice they are more likely to be inverted right handers than inverted left handers.

Martijn (admin) wrote:
And I haven't seen any detailed definition of what 'inverted writing' really is; the most detailed definition that I have seen so far is the following:

http://molly.kalafut.org/lefthanded/lefthanded.html

"Some left-handers write with their pencil facing the bottom of the page, in a "hooked" position. This is called inverted writing."[/color]

Patti wrote:...

I noticed the different reports, too. In your last post you mentioned the comparisons relating to motor skills, or how fast they would write. I saw several reports that said the motor skills were not affected or the study results didn't show much difference between inverted left handers and other hand writing positions.

Patti wrote:
This article mentions difficult birth and you mentioned the same in an earlier post. I have my doubts that the birthing process would cause a person to be left handed, much less an inverted writer. We've seen images of fetuses sucking their thumbs as soon as they have mouths and thumbs to suck and it's been shown that handedness develops early. Twin studies have shown mirrored handedness.

Patti wrote:From "Left Brain, Right Brain" Springer & Deutsch

Patti, thanks for adding the illustration!

Unfortunately, I think it doesn't bring us much further.... because I think we know that in practice left handers tend to hold a pen/pencil differently than right handers. But the picture & the comments do not appear to acknowledge that.

However, I just also noticed that in the first study the researchers simply asked to pick one of the 4 examples as representing their writing position.


If I was asked to choose, I would definitely choose the lower left example.


But I am not sure what Angelina would choose... ... yes, she doesn't use the 'hooked-variant' and yes, her wrist is in the normal position towards the paper; but I still think she could describe herself as using the 'inverted variant' (because of the direction of the ballpoint).



(I think she is somewhere in between, but it is hard to see from the photos in what direction she points here pencil).


Anway, now we at least understand how the results in those studies were 'collected'!!

Martijn (admin) wrote:
Patti, thanks for adding the illustration!

Unfortunately, I think it doesn't bring us much further.... because I think we know that in practice left handers tend to hold a pen/pencil differently than right handers. But the picture & the comments do not appear to acknowledge that.

However, I just also noticed that in the first study the researchers simply asked to pick one of the 4 examples as representing their writing position.

If I was asked to choose, I would definitely choose the lower left example. But I am not sure what Angelina would choose...

(I think she is somewhere in between, but it is hard to see from the photos in what direction she points here pencil).


Anway, now we at least understand how the results in those studies were 'collected'!!

Patti wrote:
In the 4 images there is also a difference in the angle of the paper as they write.

We're looking at several factors; aiming pen downward, slant of paper, curve of wrist and writing over or below line of writing.

In my opinion, I think writing over the top of the writing is the key factor.

...

Patti, then we do agree that there are multiple aspects involved in the pictures... but I don't understand what you exactly mean with "writing over the top".

I think the word 'inverted' simply refers to how the pen is hold.


However, the 1976 authors Levy & Reid have described the 'hooked' aspect as essential:

"From our observations more than 90 percent can be clearly defined as adopting either the "hooked" position, in which the hand lies above the line of writing; or the common right handed position in which the hand lies below the line of writing."

Taken from the last page in this document:
http://www.math.pitt.edu/~bard/classes/mth3380/cicada_hi.pdf


Angelina Jolie probably does not belong to those 90 percent... because her claw-like posture can be used BELOW the line of writing, but also ABOVE or AT the line of writing. In the example below we can see that her hand is AT the line of writing (and her wrist is appears to be at the lower side of the paper).




Maybe... 'signing autographs' is not exactly like writing... because 'signing autographs' can become something like 'painting' instead... of 'writing'!

A picture of Angelina Jolie featured with her ... 'autograph'...

Martijn (admin) wrote:

Angelina Jolie probably does not belong to those 90 percent... because her claw-like posture can be used BELOW the line of writing, but also ABOVE or AT the line of writing. In the example below we can see that her hand is AT the line of writing (and her wrist is appears to be at the lower side of the paper).




Maybe... 'signing autographs' is not exactly like writing... because 'signing autographs' can become something like 'painting' instead... of 'writing'!

A picture of Angelina Jolie featured with her ... 'autograph'...


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Patti wrote:When I say "over the top of the writing" I'm describing the same as "in which the hand lies above the line of writing".