Are animals 'handed' - left or right handed?
Yes, most are. Primates especially. Others may lead off with a right or left foot. Horses often move better one way or the other. I have watched our cats reach for something. They both use their right paw first. They also lead off with the right paw.
Are animals left or right brain dominant?
Animals like humans, have a left and right brain. One side looks at a situation logically, and tries to solve....while the other responds with emotion and instinct. I beleive that with this iguana, the right side of it's brain was the dominant, logical side. It was able to easily calculate and logically react to hitting the ball without second thought. While when the ball was on it's right side, and it used it's left side of it's brain...this was probably the lessdominant side, that responded emotionally or just took in the whole picture. It isnt used to solving logically, and had hesistation;)
Are animals also right-handed or left-handed like us?
A paper in Current Biology published 10 days ago answers your question.Apparently, two-legged locomotion is a pre requisite for left/right handedness.The team from Russia and Australia studied seven different species of marsupials. Four of these species were bipedal, and three of them four-legged. All four bipedal species showed some level of preference for one forelimb over the other. Kangaroos were especially pronounced in these behaviours, consistently using their left forelimbs for actions such as grooming, feeding, and touching. Indeed, Kangaroos seem to be lefties.None of the four legged species were seen to exhibit any sort of handedness.Summary from study:Recent studies have demonstrated a close resemblance between some handedness patterns in great apes and humans. Despite this, comparative systematic investigations of manual lateralization in non-primate mammals are very limited. Among mammals, robust population-level handedness is still considered to be a distinctive human trait. Nevertheless, the comprehensive understanding of handedness evolution in mammals cannot be achieved without considering the other large mammalian lineage, marsupials. This study was designed to investigate manual lateralization in non-primate mammals using the methodological approach applied in primate studies. Here we show that bipedal macropod marsupials display left-forelimb preference at the population level in a variety of behaviors in the wild. In eastern gray and red kangaroos, we found consistent manual lateralization across multiple behaviors. This result challenges the notion that in mammals the emergence of strong “true” handedness is a unique feature of primate evolution. The robust lateralization in bipedal marsupials stands in contrast to the relatively weak forelimb preferences in marsupial quadrupeds, emphasizing the role of postural characteristics in the evolution of manual lateralization as previously suggested for primates. Comparison of forelimb preferences in seven marsupial species leads to the conclusion that the interspecies differences in manual lateralization cannot be explained by phylogenetic relations, but rather are shaped by ecological adaptations. Species’ postural characteristics, especially bipedality, are argued to be instrumental in the origin of handedness in mammals.Paper: Page on sciencedirect.com News: Page on nature.com
What is the reason humans and animals have a left-right symmetry along a vertical axis? Why has evolution created mostly symmetric beings and creatures?
Mobile creatures evolve different front and rear ends, since they encounter the world from the front. Gravity also often leads to some dorsal versus ventral differentiation. You may have to push, walk or slide on your ventral side. It is also usually brighter dorsally, and this may influence differentiation.So now you have a front and a rear, a back and a belly, and each has differentiated to meet the environment appropriately. For example, many of your sensory units are aimed forward. Meanwhile, the world looks very much the same on your left and right. There is little selection to differentiate the two sides, so you remain symmetric.Many immobile organisms (Volvox, sea anemones) remain symmetric in 3 or 2 dimensions. But you have put your best foot forward, and that has made all the difference. Oh man, now you have lost your left-right symmetry!
Do animals exhibit right/left side dominance like humans do?
I would say that is depends on the animal. Chimps for instance have opposable thumbs, so I would say yes they do have a dominance or display traits of ambidexterity. Animals like cats and dogs have dewclaws but it is of no use to them, so no they don't have a dominant hand and they don't use their hands like animals like chimps do, they use their mouth more to help them accomplish tasks.
Do animals (mammals) like cats and dogs, have a right and left paw? Like right and left handed humans?
I'm definitely not a biologist, however, I do know that most animals prefer to lead with a specific foot/paw. My sister shows horses in 4-H and horses tend to lead with one side regardless of which direction they are turning. When showing, though, they are taught to switch leading sides.
What are some examples of animal rights?
Only a few examples off the top of my head: (1 chickens. They should range free, and have a nice life until slaughter. IF you are going to slaughter your chickens. They should never be penned up in factory farms, one of the great abominations of capitalism. (2 dogs, cats. They should go to people who will always take care of them. Human responsibility for treating companion animals with affection, kindness and care, is part of “animal rights.” (3 Wild animals. And here, I’d include grizzlies and all other wild animals put in danger by the Trump regime’s monstrous trophy-hunting drive- no doubt to please Trump’s abominable, stupid, cruel and corrupt son who had a photo posing triumphantly next to a lion he had killed. Wild animals should not be hunted. They should be left free in environments to which they are native. Those environments are rapidly disappearing. Another effect of capitalism, and the unchecked proliferation of humans - a direct result of mass poverty - on earth. (4 All animals are part of the large web of life that makes up our miraculous and singular planet. There is no Planet B. Therefore we have to safeguard what we still have, and not only for ourselves.
In a decision between left or right, do humans have a tendency to choose one or the other? Or is it 50\50?
if you talk about animals and they have to decide where to go (left or right) then may be its 50 50. because they never remember their experiences in similar situations or they cannot pass on their experiences to next generation. Usually they follow instinctsBut when it comes to humans then its not 50 50. Humans not only learn from them self, they also learn from others as well as pass on their experiences / knowledge to next generations. That is why you see humans societies improving with time. Just consider the collective knowledge of humans and how it is being improved, added with time. Animals cannot do thisComing back to question the answer is in 99% cases human decisions are based on experiences / knowledge, it’s only 1% where because of some new situations or scenario or lack of knowledge they are forced to guess 50 50 for decisions
Are dogs left/right handed (pawed)?
My experience based evidence would say that yes, they definitely are. I work with sheep dogs. One of their principal behaviours and tasks is to go wide out around a flock of animals to gather it and bring it back. When I start training a sheepdog, one of the first things I test is wether they prefer turning around the animals clockwise or anti-clockwise, right or left. Almost all dogs have a preference, more or less strong, and it's up to the trainer to be attentive and make sure the dog doesn't keep going out the side he likes, but that you insist on him also going out the awkward side, so they end up being comfortable on both.I was a gymnast when I was young, and we all had a side we did our somersaults on easily, and the other which felt very off and we had to work on a lot. The young dogs are the same when we try to make them go out on their "wrong" side: they are clearly uncomfortable, much tighter, won't come all the way around and might even be so stressed from it that they dive in and bite the animals. If the trainer is attentive to this and gently insists on them using and developing their "weak" side as well, they eventually become bi-sided.
What if these girls were animals what animals would they be from left to right?
Sheep. Dolphin. Cat. Penguin. Turtle.