ABSTRACT
The investigation of brain asymmetry has developed in two different directions. Neurologists for a century and a half collected data of the role of local brain structures of both hemispheres in the realization of some definite mental and behavioural functions. The left hemisphere extracts a few of them in order to split reality into simple elements and fragments, and to analyse them in an ordered and consequential way. In contrast, the right hemisphere grasps all interrelationships simultaneously and builds a holistic gestalt of objects or combinations of objects. The right hemisphere produces more associations on single verbal stimuli in comparison to the left one, including also very distant, indirect associations. The frontal lobe of the left hemisphere is responsible for the formation of the self-concept, enabling the subject to separate himself/herself from the world, for conscious self-realization, and for the ability to perceive oneself as an object with different and distinct characteristics.
