Roughly 90 percent of humans are right-handed, and that strong population-level bias is unusual. Most other animals show individual preferences without the species-wide skew.
Dogs are one of the species that has been studied properly, and the results are more interesting than a simple yes or no.
How it is measured
The standard test is the Kong test: give a dog a food-stuffed rubber toy and record which paw they use to hold it steady. Repeat fifty or a hundred times to get a reliable measure.
Other tests include which paw a dog offers when asked to shake, which paw they use to remove a blanket or a piece of tape from their face, and which paw steps first off a step or through a door.
Individual dogs frequently show a clear, consistent preference. Some show none at all — described as ambilateral.
The sex difference
The most consistent finding across studies is a sex bias.
Females tend towards the right paw. Males tend towards the left. This has been replicated in several studies and appears to be linked to sex hormones influencing brain lateralisation during development.
The effect is a tendency rather than a rule — plenty of individuals go the other way — and the population as a whole is roughly balanced rather than skewed like human handedness.
Why lateralisation matters
Paw preference is a visible marker of something less visible: which side of the brain is handling a task.
Broadly, in dogs as in many vertebrates, the left hemisphere — controlling the right side of the body — is associated with approach behaviour and processing familiar stimuli, while the right hemisphere is more involved in withdrawal, novelty and intense emotional responses.
This shows up in other behaviours too:
Tail wagging. Dogs wag more to the right when seeing something they want to approach, and more to the left when seeing something they are wary of. Other dogs read the difference — dogs shown left-biased wagging in videos showed higher heart rates.
Nostril use. Dogs tend to sniff novel or arousing odours with the right nostril first, shifting to the left once the smell is familiar and unthreatening.
Head turning towards sounds, which also shows directional biases depending on the emotional content of the sound.
Temperament and working ability
The practical angle: some research has found associations between lateralisation and behaviour.
- Strongly lateralised dogs, of either direction, have in some studies coped better with novel and stressful situations than ambilateral dogs
- Ambilateral dogs — those without a clear preference — have shown higher reactivity to noise in some work, including thunder and fireworks
- Some studies of guide dog and working dog programmes have examined paw preference as a predictor of training success, with mixed and generally modest results
The findings are interesting but far from settled. Studies use different tests, different measures of temperament, and different populations, and results have not always replicated. Paw preference is not a reliable way to predict an individual dog’s suitability for anything.
Testing your own dog
It is an easy thing to try, and reasonably satisfying.
The Kong test:
- Stuff a rubber toy with food
- Give it to your dog and record which paw they use to hold it
- Take the toy away, wait a moment, and repeat
- Do fifty trials, spread over several sessions
You need a decent number of trials for the result to mean anything. A handful tells you nothing, because dogs use whichever paw is convenient in a given position.
Other simple tests:
- Which paw do they offer first when you ask for a paw? Though this is heavily influenced by training
- Which paw goes first down a step
- Which paw they use to scratch at a door
- Put a light sticky note on their nose and see which paw removes it
What to do with the answer
Nothing, really. It will not change how you train or care for your dog.
But it is a small window into something genuinely interesting: that a dog’s brain, like ours, divides its labour between hemispheres, and that the division shows up in behaviour you can watch on the living room floor with a stuffed toy and a notebook.
