Do right-handed people live longer than left-handed people?

A recent study shows that left-handed people have higher accident rates and
lower life expectancies than right-handed people. The study involved researching
death certificates in two Southern California counties. The research expedition was
lead by Diane Halpern and Stanley Coren about a year ago.
The purpose of the study was to determine why fewer left-handed people are
among the elderly population. Only about ten percent of the population is lefthanded to begin with. Diane Halpern is a psychology professor at California State
University at San Bernardino and Stanley Coren is a researcher at the University of
British Columbia. The pair wanted to compare the death and accident rates of leftand right- handed people. The guiding observation was that there were more righthanded elderly people alive than left-handers They gathered a team of researchers
for their study.
The research took place in Southern California. The researchers studied the
death certificates of 987 people in two Southern California counties. The
conducted research found that right-handed females tend to live six years longer
than left0handed females. Right-handed males live eleven years longer than lefthanded males. Left-handed people are also four times more likely to die from
injuries while driving than right-handers and six times more likely to die from
accidents of all kinds.
Halpern said, The results are striking in their magnitude. Halpern is righthanded and was astounded by what the team had found. The study should be
interpreted with caution and not necessarily be used to determine ones life span.
Halpern notes, [The study] does not take into account the fitness of the
individual. The findings of the study are more general based on the sample of
death certificates researched.
Halpern relates her study to past research on the topic. Researchers thought
that because in the early years of the century, most people born left-handed were
forced to change to their right hands. So we thought we were looking at old people
who used to be left-handed but we werent. The truth was that there simply werent
many left-handers left alive, compared to right-handers.
The study gives insight into why the number of left-handed elderly people is
less than right-handed elderly people. The findings of the study are not meant to
frighten people. Researchers cannot confirm that left-handed people have shorter

life spans than right-handed people. This topic has been researched before and will
most likely be tacked in the future.