Lateralized Brain Functions: Methods in Human and Non-Human Species

Abstract

Beginning with the first discoveries of lateralized brain function and behavior in two avian species and rats, made in the 1970s and early 1980s, investigation of lateralization in nonhuman species has become a burgeoning field of research, expanding to include a wide number of vertebrate species and, more recently, even to include invertebrate species. ... Now that the field has been established it seems timely to publish in one volume the various methods used to measure lateralization in the different species. Although functional lateralization has been investigated in humans for many decades and in nonhuman species increasingly so over the last two or three decades, the methods used have not previously been gathered together in one volume. Therefore, we invited leaders in the field to write chapters on the methods they have used to investigate functional lateralization in a range of different species, including humans. We hope that by collecting these contributions together in one volume we are able to assist newcomers to the field. Also by presenting the methods adopted to investigate lateralization in a broad range of species, we hope to stimulate new research and provide a basis from which hypotheses can be tested and compared across species.