Kissing laterality and handedness

Abstract

Kissing behaviour was observed between kissing couples: about 80% turned their heads to the right to kiss. To remove the influence of one kissing partner upon the other, kissing behaviour was also observed between participants and a symmetrical doll's face: about 77% turned their heads to the right to kiss. There was no significant difference in handedness between right- and left-kissers: both groups were predominantly right-kissers. It is thought that motor bias rather than emotive bias influences kissing behaviour.

Head-turning asymmetries during kissing and their association with lateral preference

“…The results of the present study replicate the findings of Gü ntürkü n (2003) and Barrett et al (2006) showing an adult head-turning bias towards the right side, even though we found slightly fewer participants kissing to the right than these authors. Furthermore, as kissing the doll in the present study was not an emotional experience for the participants, our data further support the assumption of Barrett et al (2006) that the head-turning bias in kissing behaviour is generated by a motor bias and not by emotional processes as suggested by Nicholls et al (1999).…”

“…Furthermore, as kissing the doll in the present study was not an emotional experience for the participants, our data further support the assumption of Barrett et al (2006) that the head-turning bias in kissing behaviour is generated by a motor bias and not by emotional processes as suggested by Nicholls et al (1999).…”

“…He found a significant bias towards the right side, with 64.5% of the participants kissing to the right and 35.5% to the left. As it is problematic to judge a person's individual head-turning preference from the observation of interacting couples, Barrett, Greenwood, and McCullagh (2006) observed kissing behaviour not only between couples, but also between participants and a symmetrical doll's face to remove the influence of one kissing partner upon the other. Of the participants kissing in couples, 80.8% kissed to the right and 19.2% to the left, whereas 77.5% of the participants kissing the doll kissed to the right and 22.5% to the left.…”

“…To determine how head-turning preferences are related to handedness, Barrett et al (2006) assessed participant's handedness by asking whether they were right-or left-handed for writing. They did not find a significant difference in handedness between left-and right-kissers.…”

Cross-Modal Associations between Color and Haptics

“…Such asymmetries with a bias towards the right side were shown on a number of behaviors, including the higher probability of turning to the right when kissing (Barrett, Greenwood, & McCullagh, 2006), the tendency to turn right in a T-maze (Scharine and McBeath, 2002), and others. An example of the lateral bias that is most relevant to our case, because it also depicts bias in choice from the display, is a tendency to choose theatre seats from the right side of the seating chart (Karev, 2000), which was confirmed by actual seating behavior (Harms, Reese, and Elias, 2014).…”