Differences in Japanese handwriting function between left and right hands focusing on Japanese stroke order

Abstract

This study focused on writing order with the purpose of investigating differences in the characteristics of moving the pen when writing with the left or right hand for right-handed people. Twenty healthy, right-handed subjects were asked to draw four types of figures containing stylistic features of characters of the Japanese writing system and were given instructions regarding stroke order. The collected data were broken down into elements, and the left- and right-hand data on drawing time, writing pressure, altitude angle, azimuth angle, jerk, and handwriting were compared. As a result, we found that the writing pressure with the right hand was high for many elements, and the altitude angle and azimuth angle showed characteristic left-right differences for each element. On the other hand, there were no significant differences in jerk and handwriting between the left and right hands.

By adding the stroke order condition, we were able to show the difference in the stroke function of the left and right hands, which clarified that the non-dominant hand has an unnatural movement direction due to the influence of the stroke order and has difficulty applying pressure.