aouriri@ittvax.UUCP (Chedley Aouriri) (04/15/85)
Subject: Re: Shirt buttons Newsgroups: net.women References: <1649@decwrl.UUCP> > This has been bugging me lately... > > Does anyone know why (historically and currently) women's shirts button > right over left and men's button left over right (or is it vice versa)? > Why make the thing differently depending on who is supposed to wear it? > > Elizabeth Clayton > ...decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-satan!clayton ********************************************************** A possible explanation comes from the biology of the brain. The human brain is functionally divided into two lateral parts: The left part handles mainly the sequential, rational and "scientific" thoughts, while the right part handles the artistic, emotional and philosophical thoughts. Schematically speaking, the left part is the scientific/computer part, while the right part is the artistic/philosophical part. Statistically, most WOMEN are RIGHT-BRAINED (ie. the right part of their brain is more developed than the left part), while most MEN are LEFT-BRAINED. Whether this is the result of historical and socio-cultural conditions of the female gender is a different subject/topic. Because the SYMMETRY of the human nervous system, the left part of the brain controls the right parts of the human body (arms, hands, legs..) while the right part of the brain controls the left body parts. Therefore, most women are cleverer with their left hands than they are with their right hands, which makes it easier for them to button right-over-left buttons than the other way around. This is why male shirts are left over right buttoned, while female shirts are right over left buttoned. Also, statistically, more women are left-handed than men.
costin_2@h-sc1.UUCP (dan costin) (04/16/85)
> Subject: Re: Shirt buttons > Newsgroups: net.women > References: <1649@decwrl.UUCP> > > > This has been bugging me lately... > > > > Does anyone know why (historically and currently) women's shirts button > > right over left and men's button left over right (or is it vice versa)? > > Why make the thing differently depending on who is supposed to wear it? > > > > Elizabeth Clayton > > ...decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-satan!clayton > ********************************************************** > > A possible explanation comes from the biology of the brain. > And I always thought it was that way so you could open your MOTOS' shirt easily. -dc
thau@h-sc1.UUCP (robert thau) (04/16/85)
> > Does anyone know why (historically and currently) women's shirts button > > right over left and men's button left over right (or is it vice versa)? > > Why make the thing differently depending on who is supposed to wear it? > > A possible explanation comes from the biology of the brain. > > The human brain is functionally divided into two lateral parts... > > Statistically, most WOMEN are RIGHT-BRAINED (ie. the right part of > their brain is more developed than the left part), while most > MEN are LEFT-BRAINED... Handedness seems to me to be a lot more relevant that 'brainedness' (whatever that means), and a majority of both sexes are right-handed. Robert Thau rst@tardis.ARPA h-sc1%thau@harvard.ARPA
sasaki@harvard.ARPA (Marty Sasaki) (04/16/85)
> Subject: Re: Shirt buttons > Newsgroups: net.women > References: <1649@decwrl.UUCP> > > > This has been bugging me lately... > > > > Does anyone know why (historically and currently) women's shirts button > > right over left and men's button left over right (or is it vice versa)? > > Why make the thing differently depending on who is supposed to wear it? > > > > Elizabeth Clayton > > ...decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-satan!clayton > ********************************************************** > > A possible explanation comes from the biology of the brain. The reason is warfare. Originally shirts and coats for both men and women were buttoned the way women's shirts and coats are today. Napolean changed that since it was difficult to quickly unbutton a coat and draw a sword. By changing the way the coat was buttoned Napolean's men would be more quickly able to fight. Remember that most people are right handed (cultural bias). -- ---------------- Marty Sasaki net: sasaki@harvard.{arpa,uucp} Havard University Science Center phone: 617-495-1270 One Oxford Street Cambridge, MA 02138
dgary@ecsvax.UUCP (D Gary Grady) (04/17/85)
> Therefore, most women are cleverer with their left hands than > they are with their right hands, which makes it easier > for them to button right-over-left buttons than the other way > around. This is why male shirts are left over right buttoned, > while female shirts are right over left buttoned. I realise this is being proposed tentatively, but I rather suspect the reason for the mirror-image buttoning has to do with making it easier for people to undress each other. (And I've seen that explanation in books on historical clothing.) -- D Gary Grady Duke U Comp Center, Durham, NC 27706 (919) 684-3695 USENET: {seismo,decvax,ihnp4,akgua,etc.}!mcnc!ecsvax!dgary
jhs@duke.UUCP (Joel Saltz) (04/18/85)
In article <h-sc1.273> thau@h-sc1.UUCP (robert thau) writes: >> > Does anyone know why (historically and currently) women's shirts button >> > right over left and men's button left over right (or is it vice versa)? >> > Why make the thing differently depending on who is supposed to wear it? >> >> A possible explanation comes from the biology of the brain. >> >> The human brain is functionally divided into two lateral parts... >> >> Statistically, most WOMEN are RIGHT-BRAINED (ie. the right part of >> their brain is more developed than the left part), while most >> MEN are LEFT-BRAINED... > >Handedness seems to me to be a lot more relevant that 'brainedness' >(whatever that means), and a majority of both sexes are right-handed. > The meaning of 'more developed' in the above quote is not clear. In addition to the fact that most people are right handed, most people are left brained with respect to language in the sense that if the language areas in the left hemisphere are injured, recovery is slow and incomplete. If the analogous areas in the right hemisphere are injured, recovery is much faster and more complete. The sex difference in language dominance, if it exists, is small. The neurological differences between males and females is much more subtle (and less well understood, certainly by me and Im pretty sure by people who study these things). Joel Saltz Duke School of Medicine & Comp Sci
mupmalis@watarts.UUCP (mike upmalis) (04/18/85)
In article <1649@ittvax.UUCP> aouriri@ittvax.UUCP (Chedley Aouriri) writes: >A possible explanation comes from the biology of the brain. > >The human brain is functionally divided into two lateral parts: The >left part handles mainly the sequential, rational and "scientific" >thoughts, while the right part handles the artistic, emotional >and philosophical thoughts. Schematically speaking, the left >part is the scientific/computer part, while the right part is the >artistic/philosophical part. This is one of the pop psych definitions of the brain, and far from the truth, the labels of verbal/non verbal analytic/wholistic etc are far two simplistic. One example the execution of tasks like brushing one's teeth, may be executed by either hemisphere, but is planned by the left. As far as the artistic/philosophical distinction, some artists after right hemisphere CVAs (cardio Vascular Accidents) show a definite change but retention and even improvement in artistics and esthethics... (Reference Shattered Mind by Howard Gardner a wonderful non technical book that explains much about brain function..) Work done with split brain patients by Gazzinga, Wilson and Sperry saw no loss of purported right hemisphere skills after there inter hemipsheric communication system (corpus callosum) was severed... > >Statistically, most WOMEN are RIGHT-BRAINED (ie. the right part of >their brain is more developed than the left part), while most >MEN are LEFT-BRAINED. Whether this is the result of historical and >socio-cultural conditions of the female gender is a different >subject/topic. > About 90-95% of the population is right brain dominant for speech. More men than women are right brain dominant but this stills leaves about 90 percent of women right brain dominant. Preferred cognitive style may not necessarily reflect on hemispheric dominnace, there is a great deal of difficulty using hand preference to 'flag' which hemipshere is the boss. Actually males brains are larger on average than females, that is a stronger difference than and cross hemisphere comparison. >Because the SYMMETRY of the human nervous system, the left part >of the brain controls the right parts of the human body (arms, >hands, legs..) while the right part of the brain controls the >left body parts. > >Therefore, most women are cleverer with their left hands than >they are with their right hands, which makes it easier >for them to button right-over-left buttons than the other way >around. This is why male shirts are left over right buttoned, >while female shirts are right over left buttoned. > Ths is an overly simplistic way of looking at muscular control, issues like feedback (visual distnct from tactile), proximal vs distal musculature...) >Also, statistically, more women are left-handed than men. See previous stats ..... Strong but technical reference.. Laterality: Functional Assymetry in the Intact brain...Dr Phil Bryden (1982) -- ~~ Mike Upmalis (mupmalis@watarts)<University of Waterloo>
rst@tardis.UUCP (Robert Thau) (04/19/85)
> In article <h-sc1.273> thau@h-sc1.UUCP (robert thau) writes: > >> > Does anyone know why (historically and currently) women's shirts button > >> > right over left and men's button left over right (or is it vice versa)? > >> > Why make the thing differently depending on who is supposed to wear it? > >> > >> A possible explanation comes from the biology of the brain... > >> [some stuff unlikely to explain the differences between mens' and > >> womens' shirt buttons] > >> > >Handedness seems to me to be a lot more relevant that 'brainedness' > >(whatever that means), and a majority of both sexes are right-handed. > > > The meaning of 'more developed' in the above quote is not clear. I wrote "more relevant," not "more developed." I still think that handedness is a lot more relevant than brainedness to shirt buttons. The hands are closer to the buttons. However ... > In addition to the fact that most people are right handed, > most people are left brained with respect to language > in the sense that if the language areas in the left hemisphere > are injured, recovery is slow and incomplete. If the analogous areas > in the right hemisphere are injured, recovery is much faster and more > complete. The sex difference in language dominance, if it exists, is small. > The neurological differences between males and females is much more > subtle (and less well understood, certainly by me and Im pretty sure > by people who study these things). True as far as it goes; in fact there is even a correlation with handedness (lefties are about 50-50 for language dominance, righties are almost all left-brained for language). However, I don't think it's at all proper to equate "left-hemisphere language dominant" with simply "left-brained." What I really meant by the "whatever that means" is that the original posting (long ago, far away) seemed to smack of some trendy pop-psych hype based on the fact that (gasp!) the brain has two hemispheres. The idea is that there are people who have "right-brain" or "left-brain" modes of thought, with "right-brain" (visual, intuitive) generally considered somehow better. I once took one of these quizzes which is supposed to tell you whethe you are right- or left- brained. I came out in the middle. With that background ... It is known that there are differences between brain hemispheres, like language dominance, but the extent and meaning of the differences is just not understood. For example, the areas corresponding to the left-hemisphere speech centers in the right brain are active when a person is talking, despite the evidence from stroke recovery which seems say that they aren't used. The language areas have been known since the 1800's, but the laterality stuff hit high gear with some experiments in the 1950s by Roger Sperry. His subjects were epileptics who were treated by separation of the two cerebral hemispheres. Subsequently, the two hemispheres could be coaxed to act like two very different "people" stuck in one skull. By and large, the left brain had trouble with visual tasks but could do language well, while the right brain was the other way 'round. (Sound familiar?) However, to this day the extent to which these differences reflect differences in what the hemispheres can do (as opposed to ingrained habits) is simply unknown. For that matter, the operation's effects on the brain itself aren't entirely well characterized. For all anyone knows, the division of tasks is imposed after the operation, so that the two brains stay out of each others' way, based perhaps on a much less rigid division of labor in the normal brain. There's also a semantic problem --- as Joel pointed out, most people are left-brain dominant for language. However, the right hemisphere is almost certainly dominant for other tasks. To use an inappropriate example, most people are right-handed for most tasks, but prefer the left hand for some. Now, where this leaves the article in Discover magazine which claimed to describe right- and left-brain personality types I don't know. I certainly hope that the personnel departments which were alleged to be trying brainedness as a job qualification have as shaky a basis in known fact as their theories do. Contrary opinions welcomed. Robert Thau [bio major] rst@tardis.ARPA h-sc1%thau@harvard.ARPA
ccrdave@ucdavis.UUCP (Lord Kahless) (04/19/85)
> > Does anyone know why (historically and currently) women's shirts button > > right over left and men's button left over right (or is it vice versa)? > > Why make the thing differently depending on who is supposed to wear it? > > A possible explanation comes from the biology of the brain. > > The human brain is functionally divided into two lateral parts... > > Statistically, most WOMEN are RIGHT-BRAINED (ie. the right part of > their brain is more developed than the left part), while most > MEN are LEFT-BRAINED... Another explanation for the difference in shirts is that it is easier for a woman holding a child to button her blouse with the present arrangement of buttons. Also, many historical traditions have biblical roots. Under the law of the Lord, it is forbidden for a man to wear a woman's clothes or a woman to wear a man's clothes. Clothing makers were no doubt aware that the sexes WANTED different looking clothing, and so made shirts significantly different for each sex.
werner@aecom.UUCP (Craig Werner) (04/19/85)
> > Subject: Re: Shirt buttons > > > > A possible explanation comes from the biology of the brain. > > Wrong. Most women, like most men are left-brained. This includes almost all right handers and about half of left-handers (I just got back from a Neuro exam - I was perusing Readnews to forget about Neuroscience up until this moment.) Maybe more women than men (percentage-wise) are right-brained, but the difference is not enough to build an industry over. -- Craig Werner !philabs!aecom!werner What do you expect? Watermelons are out of season!
urol@ecsvax.UUCP (Floyd A. Fried) (04/20/85)
Thought provoking notions concerning the way men and women's shirts button. I strongly suspect it is a convention that began with tailors and has been perpetuated by clothing manufacturers to assure that there will be no sharing of garments and hence fewer garments needed and sold.
chu@lasspvax.UUCP (Clare Chu) (04/20/85)
In article <> aouriri@ittvax.UUCP (Chedley Aouriri) writes: >Subject: Re: Shirt buttons >Newsgroups: net.women >References: <1649@decwrl.UUCP> > >> This has been bugging me lately... >> >> Does anyone know why (historically and currently) women's shirts button >> right over left and men's button left over right (or is it vice versa)? >> Why make the thing differently depending on who is supposed to wear it? >> >> Elizabeth Clayton >> ...decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-satan!clayton >********************************************************** > >A possible explanation comes from the biology of the brain. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I know this has nothing to do with biology, but the reason women's shirts are buttoned right over left is that in the old days a woman was dressed by her maid and a man dresses himself. Clare