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

[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.