Novelty is handled by the right hemisphere, and is transferred to the left hemisphere as it becomes familiar🧠
Since the right hemisphere has broad, global, and flexible attention, while the left has narrow attention, it follows that in almost every case what is new must first be present in the right hemisphere, before it can come into focus for the left hemisphere. For one thing, the right hemisphere alone attends to the peripheral field of vision from which new experience tends to come; only the right hemisphere can direct attention to what comes to us from the edges of our awareness, regardless of side. Anything newly entering our experiential world instantly triggers a release of norepinephrine—mainly in the right hemisphere. Novel experience induces changes in the right hippocampus, but not the left. So it is no surprise that phenomenologically it is the right hemisphere that is attuned to the apprehension of anything new.
This difference is pervasive across domains. Not just new experience, but the learning of new information or new skills also engages the right hemispheres attention more than left, even if the information is verbal in nature. However, once the skills have become familiar through practice, they shift to being the concern of the left hemisphere, even for skills such as playing a musical instrument.
References
- Mcgilchrist, Iain. (2010). The Master and His Emissary Chapter 2 What Do the Hemispheres Do (84). London, UK: Yale University Press.
Metadata
Type:🔴 Tags: Biology / Neuroscience / Neuropsychology Status:☀️