AbstractOpen data initiatives such as the UK Biobank and Human Connectome Project provide researchers with access to neuroimaging, genetic, and other data for large samples of left-and right-handed participants, allowing for more robust investigations of handedness than ever before. Handedness inventories are universal tools for assessing participant handedness in these large-scale neuroimaging contexts. These self-report measures are typically used to screen and recruit subjects, but they are

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... lso widely used as variables in statistical analyses of fMRI and other data. Recent investigations into the validity of handedness inventories, however, suggest that self-report data from these inventories might not reflect hand preference/performance as faithfully as previously thought. Using data from the Human Connectome Project, we assessed correspondence between three handedness measures – the Edinburgh Handedness Inventory (EHI), the Rolyan 9-hole pegboard, and grip strength – in 1179 healthy subjects. We show poor association between the different handedness measures, with roughly 10% of the sample having at least one behavioral measure which indicates hand-performance bias opposite to the EHI score, and over 65% of left-handers having one or more mismatched handedness scores. We discuss implications for future work, urging researchers to critically consider direction, degree, and consistency of handedness in their data.