handedness

[ han-did-nis ]

noun
  1. a tendency to use one hand more than the other.

Origin of handedness

1
First recorded in 1920–25; handed + -ness

Words Nearby handedness

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use handedness in a sentence

  • They do not welcome the Muslim Brothers' authoritarianism, oppression and heavy handedness, and they will not put up with it.

    Coup by Acclamation? | Hussein Ibish | July 4, 2013 | THE DAILY BEAST
  • Deadspin ripped it for stuffiness, high-handedness, and general cluelessness.

  • In contrast to the seriousness and heavy-handedness of late-era Idol, X Factor feels positively effervescent.

    Why I Love ‘The X Factor’ | Richard Rushfield | September 21, 2011 | THE DAILY BEAST
  • Marian is delightful, with her waywardness and high-handedness; and Mrs. Owen likes originals, not feeble imitations.

    A Hoosier Chronicle | Meredith Nicholson
  • The Vicomte laughed in his kindly way at what he was pleased to term my high-handedness.

    Dross | Henry Seton Merriman
  • Addison we know to have been a little on the hither side of open-handedness.

    Washington Irving | Henry W. Boynton
  • This recognition of deft-handedness, small claim on consideration as it might seem, was still a balm to the child.

    The Open Question | Elizabeth Robins
  • But the partizans of Belinchon triumphed all along the line by reason of their numbers, their riches, and their open-handedness.

    The Fourth Estate, vol. 2 | Armando Palacio Valds

British Dictionary definitions for handedness

handedness

/ (ˈhændɪdnɪs) /


noun
  1. the tendency to use one hand more skilfully or in preference to the other

  2. the property of some chemical substances of rotating the plane of polarized light in one direction rather than another: See also dextrorotation, laevorotation

  1. the relation between the vectors of spin and momentum of neutrinos and certain other elementary particles: See also helicity

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Scientific definitions for handedness

handedness

[ hăndĭd-nĭs ]


  1. A preference for using one hand rather than the other to perform most manual tasks and activities. Most people are right-handed. Historically, it has been theorized that handedness is associated with a dominance of the opposite cerebral hemisphere of the brain, but this has not been conclusively proven. Although the scientific basis for handedness is unknown, the fact that left-handed parents more frequently have left-handed offspring suggests at least a partial genetic component. Some experts believe that children are trained to favor one hand over the other (usually the right hand.). Handedness is usually established in the first few years of life.

The American Heritage® Science Dictionary Copyright © 2011. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.