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Health

What is the Difference Between the Right Brain and Left Brain?

By Carol Francois
Updated Feb 24, 2024
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The brain is divided into two hemispheres, the right brain and left the brain. It is a very complex structure, but a modern theory suggests that each side is responsible for a different type of thinking. It is very difficult to separate the two structures, but experiments have determined that one side has more activity for specific types of brain activity than the other.

According to this theory, the right brain is responsible for random, intuitive, holistic, synthesizing and subjective thinking. The left brain is responsible for: logic, sequential, rational, analytical, and objective thinking. Each person has a bias, based on how they use the right brain and left brain to solve problems.

People who have a right brain dominance first apply creativity to problem solving. They are more reliant on intuition and quickly grasp the overall picture of a situation. As a rule, right brain thinkers are not very detail-oriented.

Left brain-dominant people prefer reason over everything else. They use rational logic to identity the cause of a problem and then think about how to solve it. As a general rule, left brain thinkers are detail-oriented.

The distinction between the functions of the right brain and left brain was first made during early attempts to identify the causes of speech issues. An autopsy of a patient with a severe speech disorder showed a large tumor on the left side of the brain. This tumor caused the patient to lose the ability to create a logical train of thought, although retaining the ability to speak.

Further research and investigation revealed a deep correlation between areas of brain activity and specific types of tasks. This area of research has grown considerably, as work on stroke rehabilitation and brain injury treatment become more important.The more we know about how the right brain and left brain function, the better treatment plans we can create to help these patients recover.

The difference between right brain and left brain is really one of preference. Both sections function normally and are required to work together on a wide range of tasks. The personal preference that we show between details and generalities are related to which side of the brain we prefer to use. Many physiologists reject this idea of hemisphere dominance and point out that this preference is one of personality. A person can be trained to use either side to a sufficient level of skill that there is no clear preference.

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Discussion Comments

By sunshine31 — On Dec 13, 2010

Latte31-I totally agree. I think that men tend to be more analytical and definitely use their left brain functions even more.

They think logically and while this form of thinking makes sense sometimes problems present themselves that are not logical in nature or are difficult to understand.

Here the intuitive thought is far superior because the “Gut feeling” comes into play when we can not put the pieces of a puzzling situation together but are getting messages which is really our intuition that something is not right.

This theory can even be applied to test taking. Often test takers are told to pick the first answer that they are comfortable with and not change their answers.

It is believed that the first answer usually is the best choice and people should trust their gut feeling in order to select the right answer.

By latte31 — On Dec 12, 2010

The right brain vs. left brain is really interesting. The differences between the left brain and right brain thinking really determine how a person will go about solving a problem.

Right brain functions handle intuition and creative ideas. A person with a dominance in these brain hemispheres tend to be more emotional and think in terms of intuition and creative thought.

The person with a dominant left brain often seeks logic and reasoning in order to solve a problem. The problem would have to be logically thought out and a concrete answer would ensue.

These are the main difference between left and right brain. It could also be said that women tend to be more right brain dominant while men tend to be more left brain dominant.

Women often say that they have a “Hunch” or a “Feeling” about something and men often respond that the women does not know for sure if this is a fact and that they are merely speculating.

Women in this regard can be very subjective because their reasoning is based on intuition and not logic.

However, women also tend to be very creative thinkers and usually dominate the fields of advertising and public relations that require enormous creativity.

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