International Left Handers Day is observed every year on August 13 to celebrate the uniqueness and differences of the left handers. The day was first observed in 1976 by Dean R. Campbell, who is the founder of the Lefthanders International, Inc.
International Left Hander’s Day was created to raise awareness of the advantages and disadvantages of being left-handed in a predominantly right-handed world. It celebrates those peoples’ uniqueness and differences, a subset of humanity comprising seven to ten percent of the world’s population.
The day also spread awareness on issues faced by left-handers, for instance, the importance of the special needs for left-handed children, and the likelihood for left-handers to develop schizophrenia.
Facts you should know:
- There are approximately 708 million left-handed people in the world. Men are more likely to be left handed than women.
- According to The Washington Post, experts say, only about 10 percent of people worldwide are left-handed.
- Research suggests a variety of factors are involved when it comes to the biological basis of hand preferences. This includes genes, birth weight, mother’s age, preterm births, multiple births, ultrasounds during pregnancy, to name a few. But most of the reasons remain “largely unexplained.”
- Studies have also shown that males are more likely to be left-handed than females.
- According to the National Institutes of Health, hand preference develops before birth and becomes apparent in early childhood.
Some of the famous lefties include Barack Obama, Bill Gates, Lady Gaga, Julia Roberts, Mark Zuckerberg, Whoopi Goldberg, Oprah Winfrey, Paul McCartney, Marie Curie, Charlie Chaplin, Tom Cruise, Albert Einstein, Lewis Carroll, Leonardo Da Vinci, Helen Keller, Aristotle, Amitabh Bachchan, Sachin Tendulkar, Angelina Jolie, Julius Caesar, Aristotle, Neil Armstrong, Winston Churchill and Martina Navratilova.