Abstract
Ten Ss served in this experiment, five right-handed and five left-handed. Every S was tested in a perceived-order situation and by the up-and-down method to determine the relative on-latency for a visual test stimulus. i.e, (ON-Lat for lest stimulus involving right hemisphere- ON-Lat for standard stimulus involving left hemisphere) and to determine a similarly defined relative off-latency for the same test stimulus. The algebraic difference between the relative on-latency measure and the relative off-latency measure was then found. Data from a previous study had suggested that this “on-off difference” was characteristically positive for left-handed Ss and negative for right-handed Ss. The present data agree. The left-handed Ss were found to differ significantly from the right-handed Ss in the magnitude of the on-off difference. This outcome appears important as a possible clue to functional interhemispheric differences related to handedness.
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This .study was supported in part under Research Grant NB-05576-01 from the National Institutes of Health. The present paper is a version of a mimeographed report submitted to N.I.H: Kappauf, W. E., and Yeatman, F. R. “On-and Off-Latencies and Handedness,” Report No.5, January 19, 1968.
The authors gratefully acknowledge the help and cooperation of Lawrence M. Stolurow and Henry T. Lippert who arranged that the SOCRATES system could be used in conducting this experiment. This system consisted of an IBM 1710 control system, an IBM 1620 computer, and auxiliary custom units. It was developed at the Training Research Laboratory, University of Illinois, for use in the study of programmed self-instruction and individualized education under ONR Contract Nonr 3985(04).
In terms of the character of the binomial distribution for n = 10, rejection of the null hypothesis at the .05 level should follow in eight out of nine times that the above outcome is obtained. See Tocher (1950).
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Kappauf, W.E., Yeatman, F.R. Visual on- and off-latencies and handedness. Perception & Psychophysics 8, 46–50 (1970). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03208932
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03208932