Your Therapy Source Magazine for Pediatric Therapists April 2016 | Page 8

Handedness, Language and Autism
Did you know that about 90% of humans are right
handed? Did you also know that research
indicates a decreased degree of right-handedness
in children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD)?
In addition, other research found that children with
ASD tended to have more mixed-handedness, but
that those who had a definite hand preference
performed better on motor, language, and cognitive
tests than those who did not.
Here are some more interesting facts for the
majority of the population:
1. the left hemisphere plays a dominant role in
both manual skills and language functions.
2. handedness is generally established by about
3 years of age, with changes in the degree of
handedness occurring until school age.
3. children who frequently cross the midline are more strongly right- or left-handed and
crossing values correlated with handedness scores.
Perceptual and Motor Skills published research on handedness, assessed by task
performance, and standardized receptive and expressive language tests. The subjects
included 110 children with ASD (96 boys; M age = 8.3 years, SD = 3.8) and 45 typically
developing children (37 boys; M age = 8.6 years, SD = 4.3), 3 to 17 years of age. The results
indicated that:
1. children in the ASD group had a lower handedness score (was less strongly lateralized)
than the control group.
2. children in the ASD group exhibited a small effect of handedness on language; righthanders had better language than non-r