Turning left

[ladyofastolat]

I've just reading something about school library design, and have come across the sentence, "Market research shows that faced with no clear direction, most people in the UK turn left." There's no source given, and I can't find anything online, so I have no idea what the evidence for this is, of what "most people" means. However, thinking about, I think that I do indeed default to turning left.

Is this because English is written from left to right? If I entered a room at an exhibition that had information panels around the perimeter wall, I'd expect the panels - like the words upon them - to be read from left to right, so I'd turn left. Do people from countries where writing goes from right to left tend to turn right?

Or is it related to driving on the left? Is it because turning left feels unobstructive, while turning right, even when on foot, feels like cutting across the traffic? Are people in all those countries that drive on the right less likely than people in the UK to turn to the left?

Or is it because turning left when you enter a large room will take you clockwise around the room?

Comments

[pellegrina.livejournal.com]

That's funny because a factoid lodged in my brain states that most people faced with no clear direction turn right. Is the UK different? Is it related to what side of the road you drive on? (In which case everyone turns the suicidal way.) Is my factoid wrong or is the market research?

[clarienne.livejournal.com]

Perhaps its related to most people's right eye being dominant?

[rubygirl29.livejournal.com]

It seems (according to marketing research) that most people in the US bear right rather than left. So perhaps it is related to driving. Huh. I know that when I am forced by traffic patterns in a grocery store to go left, I feel vaguely disoriented.

[bunn.livejournal.com]

Paco Underhill's "Why we buy" says that American shoppers tend to go right, but in the UK and Australia, they go left. He believes this is related to driving on the left, as the majority of people are right handed and are more likely to see and reach for an item slightly to their right.

If there are no references given in your document, I wonder if a study has actually been done of British primary school children to see if they really do turn left by default in libraries, or if someone is extrapolating from a study of adult shoppers? If it is related to driving, it seems odd that even primary children would have the same instinct.

[pellegrina.livejournal.com]

I don't drive here or in the States, and I tend to drift right anyway, unless I become self-conscious, in which case I dither and turn left because I am lefthanded. To be honest I wonder if in my case it is because among the shops we went into most frequently as a child, the only one you didn't walk straight into was the local grocery store, where you turned right immediately after entering.

[bunn.livejournal.com]

That might suggest that in a culture of right-turnees, turning right might become an inbuilt cultural preference even among the minority lefthanders?

Either way, he goes on to say that this preference is very easily broken by positioning of desirable stuff, but that once you've started people turning the 'abnormal' way you have to be careful, because once the diverting item has been inspected, they will return to type.

This can mean that if you have a bunch of right-drifters, you distract them to the left, then they start drifting right again, you can end up with areas of your shop virtually unvisited as you haven't let the customer do a natural circuit...

[ladyofastolat.livejournal.com]

I've just reserved that book from the library. Several books I've read recently have touched on the techniques supermarkets use to push shoppers into making the choices they want us to make, and it all seems very interesting.

The document I was reading was about secondary school library design, but I expect it was just extrapolating from a study of adult shoppers. Though I suppose even small children could pick up the instinct from years being pushed in buggies or led by the hand in the direction that their parents default to going in.

[bunn.livejournal.com]

'why we buy' is very readable and interesting. My copy is the 1999 one, I keep meaning to get hold of the updated, more ecommerce-aware version.

[emily-shore.livejournal.com]

I automatically turn right. So I think it is related to driving direction and early experience.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

I turn left, and am strongly left-handed. I too suspect driving is behind it.

[louis-soul.livejournal.com]

In a library I used to frequent, the shelves of books I always went to were down on the left side.
After the library was remodled the books were down on the right side and it feels vaguely unsatisfying.

[segh.livejournal.com]

I don't have the book to hand but I'm pretty sure there's some stuff on this in "The American Way Of Death" - re which side of the shop they stack the most expensive coffins.

[the-marquis.livejournal.com]

I don't drive but would probably go left. I did read recently somewhere that as most people are right handed they tend to go to the right, so it suggested that if you want to be served at a busy bar go to the left end as you face it.

So maybe handedness plays a part that driving then overides?

[ladyofastolat.livejournal.com]

Interesting. I think I find it more natural to look to the right, but I think if I was faced with five people at a bar, and no idea who came first, it would feel most natural to serve them in order starting from my left, since I read from left to right. Though of course the chaotic comings and goings of a bar would mean that it wasn't as simple as that.

I'm now thinking about bus stops. If there's a bus stop with one person standing at it, does the queue tend to form to the left or right of that person?

[muuranker.livejournal.com]

The 'turn left' phonomenon is known to museum designers in the UK. The Oriental Galleries at the V&A were designed to 'turn right', and visitors commented on this.

[kargicq.livejournal.com]

I'd always heard it was turn right, like some other posters are saying. In our local Tesco, and in our Safeway back in Aylesbury, it was "enter and turn right", and I'd assumed this was why... N.

[jane-somebody.livejournal.com]

Hmmn, I *think* I generally turn right. I'm not a driver, of course, if that has anything to do with it (though I am a bike/trike road-user, so maybe not.) Mind you, it was always drummed into me from a very early age (visiting grandparents in the country) that as a pedestrian you should ALWAYS walk on the *right* side of an un-pavemented road, i.e. facing the oncoming traffic so you have plenty of time to see them and dodge out of the way, and it always irritates me when I see walkers failing to do that. I have no idea whether that might be a factor.

Anyway, it now seems I have an explanation as to why when visiting museums/displays etc I always seem to be reading the end of the story first, and have to stop and figure out where the first board is to start reading there...