429:, fore and aft are nautical terms that convey an impersonal relative direction in the context of the moving frame of persons aboard a ship. The need for impersonal terms is most clearly seen in a rowing shell where the majority of the crew face aft ("backwards"), hence the oars to their right are actually on the port side of the boat. Rowers eschew the terms left, right, port and starboard in favor of stroke-side and bow-side. The usage derives from the tradition of having the stroke (the rower closest to the stern of the boat) oar on the port side of the boat.
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496:. Conversely, Left–right discrimination (LRD) refers to a person's ability to differentiate between left and right. LRC is reported by approximately 15% of the population according to the 2020 research by Van der Ham and her colleagues. People who have LRC can typically perform daily navigational tasks, such as driving according to road signs or following a map, but may have difficulty performing actions that require a precise understanding of directional commands, such as
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453:, even when describing small-scale spaces. For instance, if they wanted someone to move over on the car seat to make room, they might say "move a bit to the east". To tell someone where exactly they left something in their house, they might say, "I left it on the southern edge of the western table." Or they might warn a person to "look out for that big ant just north of your foot". Other peoples "from
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323:. With respect to a ship 'forward' would indicate the relative position of any object lying in the direction the ship is pointing. For symmetrical objects, it is also necessary to define forward and backward in terms of expected direction. Many mass transit trains are built symmetrically with paired control booths, and definitions of forward, backward, left, and right are temporary.
261:. Up is then defined as the opposite direction of down. Another common definition uses a human body, standing upright, as a frame of reference. In that case, up is defined as the direction from feet to head, perpendicular to the surface of the Earth. In most cases, up is a directionally oriented position generally opposite to that of the pull of gravity.
280:, where "stage left" "stage right" are, by convention, defined from the point of view of actors facing the audience. "Upstage" and "downstage" do not follow gravity but by convention mean away from and towards the audience. An example of a non-egocentric view is
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will be preferentially directed opposite that axis. Since counter-clockwise may be defined in terms of up, forward, and right, this experiment unambiguously differentiates left from right using only natural elements: if they were reversed, or the atoms spun
288:, returning to an egocentric view. In medicine and science, where precise definitions are crucial, relative directions (left and right) are the sides of the organism, not those of the observer. The same is true in heraldry, where left and right in a
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as a frame of reference. Since there is a very noticeable force of gravity acting between the Earth and any other nearby object, down is defined as that direction which an object moves in reference to the Earth when the object is allowed to
311:. Forward is defined as the direction in which the object is moving. Backward is then defined as the opposite direction to forward. Alternatively, 'forward' may be the direction pointed by the observer's
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are terms mainly used to describe artistic images, and overcome the potential confusion that a figure's "own" right or "proper right" hand is on the left hand as the viewer sees it from the front.
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Since definitions of left and right based on the geometry of the natural environment are unwieldy, in practice, the meaning of relative direction words is conveyed through
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In situations where a common frame of reference is needed, it is most common to use an egocentric view. A simple example is road signage. Another example is
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Harris, Lauren Julius; Gitterman, Steven R. (1978). "University professors' self-descriptions of left-right confusability: sex and handedness differences".
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338:. Facing the sun, before noon, the north pointer of the compass points to the "left" hand. After noon, it points to the "right".
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Most human cultures use relative directions for reference, but there are exceptions. Some
Australian Aboriginal languages like
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Hannay HJ, Ciaccia PJ, Kerr JW, Barrett D (1990). "Self-report of right-left confusion in college men and women".
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is treated as if the shield were being held by the armiger. To avoid confusion, Latin terminology is employed:
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661:"Distinguishing left from right: A large-scale investigation of left–right confusion in healthy individuals"
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Brandt, Jason; Mackavey, William (1981). "Left-right confusion and the perception of bilateral symmetry".
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person's body or a road sign. The most common ones are:
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Stralen HE (2020).
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30:"Upright" redirects here. For other uses, see
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822:(3 Pt 1): 819–823.
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461:and from
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467:Bali
445:and
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