10 years ago by
A Pianist
Hi, All!
Some time ago, I carried out an experiment that may have some significance for the way we think about hand function in piano playing.
35 right-handed male individuals - no professional musicians among them - took part. They were asked to do the following, right hand first, then left hand:
1) Close one of those cheap hand grippers you can get in the average sport shop (not captain crush or anything professional):
a) with the fingers from the palm and light thumb support (proper instruction about placement in the palm given)
b) with the thumb from the middle joint and light finger support
2) Open the hand against resistance in the following fashion:
a) put one of those girl's elastic hair bands around the middle of the hand (fingers straight, thumb held close to the hand palm) and open the hand with the thumb, focusing on the middle joint, not the wrist. Fingers do not participate and stay together. If successful, add a band until failure occurs.
b) put one of those girl's elastic hair bands around the middle of the hand (fingers straight, thumb excluded) and open the hand with combination 2-5 and/or (preferable) 5 alone. Middle and ring finger do not participate and stay together. If successful, add a band until failure occurs.
The results were quite revealing:
1) ALL of the participants could EASILY close the gripper with the fingers with the RIGHT hand, while they had certainly difficulty with the LEFT hand. This was to be expected.
2) Only 9 of the participants could close the gripper with the thumb with the RIGHT hand (26 could not!), while ALL participants could EASILY close it that way with the LEFT hand!
3) Only those same 9 successful participants in the previous test were able to manage 3 hairbands or more in both exercises (2a and 2b) with the RIGHT hand (26 could not!), while ALL participants could easily open up to 6 hairbands with the left hand.
Since no left-handed individuals were included, we have to be careful with the results, but I'd like to try for a conclusion:
Either:
1) The left hand is inherently better at gripping, specifically in pinch grips;
and/or:
2) The right hand is weaker because in our society it focuses more on precision activities and the thumb plays a secondary role. More often than not, we tend to use the wrist instead of the thumb itself in activities that would ideally require thumb function. The ones who passed all tests successfully admitted that they had done some kind of special pinch gripping activity with the right hand related to sports.
Any other ideas? Especially about what this means for piano playing?
Paul
