Left and Right of the Brain: Why Balanced Development Matters
A crawling baby isn’t just exploring their environment. They’re building independence and muscular strength while honing sensory skills like balance, vision, and hearing. Crucially, they’re also engaging both sides of the brain in a coordinated way.
When a baby moves one arm and the opposite leg (called criss-cross crawling), they integrate and process information from multiple senses. This cross-lateral movement doesn’t only involve arms and legs—similar ‘criss-crossing’ of signals happens inside the head, helping connect the right and left side of the brain via neural pathways. These links are essential for continued communication between the two hemispheres.
How Does Crawling Support Brain Balance?
Crawling activates both hemispheres in a balanced way. It also allows babies to cross the midline of the body (for example, moving the right arm to the left side), which supports reflex integration. This is one reason why many paediatric therapists ask if your child ever crawled—they understand how early cross-lateral movement can help set the stage for healthy development in both left and right of the brain.
How the Brain Works: A Quick Overview
Your child’s brain is responsible for:
- Thoughts and choices
- Feelings and memories
- Movements, balance, and coordination
- Sensations, including pleasure and pain
- Breathing, heart rate, and temperature regulation
- Speech and language
- Organ function
- Stress responses (fight, flight, or freeze)
It’s divided into specialised regions (or lobes), yet each half—left side brain and right side brain—must communicate smoothly. For instance, the right temporal lobe aids recognition of faces and objects (visual memory), while the left temporal lobe helps in understanding and recalling language (verbal memory). These lobes constantly share information through neural pathways, meaning the hemispheres reinforce each other’s functions.
Left Right Brain Functions in Practice
The left hemisphere is often linked to language, analytical thinking, and logic. The right hemisphere is commonly associated with spatial awareness, pattern recognition, and interpreting figurative language. Real-world tasks, however, use both sides. A great example is understanding colloquial expressions like “It’s raining cats and dogs!”—the left brain processes the literal words, while the right brain infers the figurative meaning.
What Happens When One Side Grows Faster?
Ideally, the right and left side brain functions develop in harmony, enabling seamless data flow across both hemispheres. Sometimes, though, an injury (e.g. stroke or trauma) damages one side, or one hemisphere may outpace the other in growth. Alternatively, the neural pathways connecting them might not form correctly. In these cases, an imbalance in left right brain functions can emerge.
Possible Signs of an Imbalance
- Slower processing or difficulty focusing
- Poor body coordination and uneven movement patterns
- Learning difficulties or challenges in academic tasks
- Social struggles, sometimes seen in neurobehavioural conditions (e.g. ADHD or autism)
- Behavioural changes after an injury or stroke
The good news is that the brain is flexible (neuroplastic). When guided by the right stimuli, new neural pathways can develop, allowing one region to compensate for or enhance the other.
How do I know if the brain is not balanced?
A brain imbalance may present in several different ways. Sometimes, it’s quite obvious, such as a loss of function after a stroke. Here, there’s a clear difference in function before and after that event. Depending on the nature and severity of the injury, the person may be able to regain some of that lost function by training their brain to harness other areas and develop new neural pathways.
At other times, a brain imbalance may be less obvious, particularly in children – after all, you’ve only ever known your child this way.
Brain imbalance lies behind many of the conditions that may affect a child’s progress relative to their peers. That includes learning disabilities, neurodevelopmental conditions and neurobehavioural disorders. Signs include slower processing, poor body coordination and movement patterns and, often, social difficulties.
But the brain isn’t set in stone. It’s a marvellously adaptable organ that changes over time depending on the stimulus it receives. That’s where brain training comes in.
Right Side vs Left Side of the Brain: The Role of Brain Training
Brain training leverages the concept of neuroplasticity to strengthen a weaker hemisphere. Targeted exercises, therapies, and activities can stimulate specific areas, helping build new connections and improving overall balance between the left and right of the brain.
One study by Harvard University and Maclean Hospital found that brain training in children with ADHD could:
- Reduce their ADHD index scores significantly
- Decrease hyperactive behaviours
- Improve concentration
- Build stronger links between brain areas involved in memory and stress responses (shown by brain imaging)
These findings support the idea that strategic, personalised interventions may help individuals experiencing challenges in either hemisphere.
Personalised therapy programs at Neurofit Brain Centre
Here at Neurofit Brain Centre, we use many personalised therapy programs (often in combination) to stimulate the chosen area of your child’s brain and form new neural pathways.
It may be helpful for children with learning disorders or conditions like ADHD and autism.
We begin with a detailed assessment and then, based on these findings, we develop a personalised treatment plan that often involves an intensive 12-week program to stimulate any injured or underdeveloped areas of your child’s brain.
If you’d like to learn more about how we may be able to help your child, please contact us.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: Are we all strictly ‘left-brained’ or ‘right-brained’?
A: In reality, most tasks require both sides. While some functions may dominate one hemisphere (e.g. language in the left, spatial tasks in the right), the complete picture is more nuanced. Real-life processing almost always involves both hemispheres working together.
Q: How do I know if my child might have an imbalance in the right and left side brain functions?
A: Look for consistent challenges such as difficulty focusing, slower development in motor skills, or social/behavioural issues beyond typical variations. An in-depth assessment can determine whether hemispheric imbalances are present.
Q: Can you retrain the brain after a stroke or injury?
A: Yes. In many cases, strategic brain training helps form new neural pathways and improve function, even after significant injuries.
Q: What does therapy look like at Neurofit Brain Centre?
A: We often combine multiple methods, tailored to each child’s needs, over a focused 12-week period. The goal is to encourage healthy growth and communication between both hemispheres.
Disclaimer
All information is general and is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice. Neurofit Brain Centre can consult with you to confirm if a particular treatment approach is right for you.
