Air Gun Home :: View topic - son is right handed but left eye dominant

raydar077 · New Member

I just my six year old a daisy buck for xmas. My question is should i have him learn to shot left or right handed being that he right handed but left eye dominant? I'm the same way but i have always shot right handed so i think it would be to hard for me to change now. I have heard that if your left eye dominant you should shot left handed. Does it really matter?

Slavia · Moderator

In theory, you should go with the dominant eye, rather than hand. The eye controls a complex system of nerves and muscles, so you should use the good one. All the hand does is put pressure on the trigger. Additionally, in times of stress the body shuts down blood flow to the weak eye. If you're excited because there's a monster buck standing right in front of you, then you might be partially blind in the weak eye.

That said, go for comfort. If your son is so strongly right hand dominant that any other way feels awkard, let him do it right-handed. You don't want to frustrate him so that he loses interest this early in his shooting career. Have him try it both ways, and at the very least he'll have the information to use later should he so choose. Shoot some groups, and if the left eye gives tighter groups that might motivate him to shoot left-handed. The only real rules are to be safe and have fun.

gicos · Member

My son is the same. I can say based upon 20 years of training marksmanship to Soldiers that most find it easier to retrain their weak eye than their weak arm. Both eyes are working during all waking hours, though one harder than the other, while the same is not true for arms. And there's a lot more to the role of the arms than just squeezing the trigger. I've seen Soldiers struggle for years trying to fire with their dominant eye and weak arm and have terrible luck just because they were told they had to do it that way (everyone is tested for eye dominance in basic training). What I've seen is that less than 25% are successful retraining their weak arm while the rest are eventually successful firing with their weak eye.

One thing not to let him do is fire with the strong arm and strong eye at the same time, draping his head over the stock to get his eye behind the sight. I had mine wear an eye patch over his dominant eye for a while when he started out, to kick the habit, and it worked. He'll also thank you later when he doesn't have to deal with the scarcity of guns of the left handed variety.

Slavia · Moderator

rsterne · Moderator

I found out that my Ex was left eye dominant when we took up archery.... instictive style where you shoot with both eyes open.... so I HAD to trade in her bow for a lefty and retrain her to shoot left handed.... When we subsequently took up .22LR Indoor I just handed her the gun left handed and she learned it that way from the start, no problem.... The BIG problem I can see with letting him learn to shoot right handed is if he ever wants to use a shotgun.... You have to wing-shoot with both eyes open to get the depth perception so critical to speed, direction, and lead.... and he will have a devil of a time because his left eye will be pointing the tip of the barrel at (in front of) the target but the gun will be aiming wayyyyyyyyy to the left of where he's looking.... You can learn to shoot with the non-dominant eye with the other one closed.... I don't think you have a hope of doing it with both open....

Bob

gicos · Member

Very true, Bob. There's probably also quite a bit of difference for someone who shoots a lot for many years, like military folk, versus occasional shooters. Completely retraining either the weak eye or weak arm to a high level of marksmanship will take a long time regardless of which route is chosen, at least for an adult. Someone who has to do a lot of it and to qualify in order to keep their job is more inclined to really stick with it until they've got it, where others may give up in frustration. I've seen folks do the instinctive shooting (both eyes open) on the side of their weak eye and do it well, but only after years of training that weak eye to do the work. A young child won't have great marksmanship when starting out anyway, so they're no more frustrated than they would be otherwise.

It's really a pickle that Ma Nature hands us with folks who have eye and hand dominance on opposite sides. My take is that it's much easier to teach a young child to use their weak eye, since they haven't been around nearly as long to have deeply ingrained muscle (eye) memory. The same can be argued for right hand dominance, the difference being that hand coordination is learned while vision is totally subconscious. The conscious learned function is more habit forming and harder to undo than a subconscious function like vision in my experience.

I'm certainly no world authority on the subject, but that's my 3 1/2 pennies. These are the reasons I trained my son and many Soldiers the way I did, and it was only after a great deal of contemplation and instruction. Bravo to you for contemplating.

shawn706 · Member

From the Daisy 10 lesson criculum.

Each of us is either right-handed or left-handed depending on which hand we use most frequently to do daily tasks. In the same way, each of us has one eye which we use to focus directly on an object.
That eye is known as our dominant eye. To shoot effectively, we must know which is our dominant, or master eye. If you have a right dominant eye you should shoot from the right shoulder, and if you have a left dominant eye you should shoot from the left shoulder. There is a simple exercise we can do that lets us determine which, is our dominant eye.
• Pick a partner and, standing ten to fifteen feet apart, face each other.
• Extend your arms to full length.
• With both eyes open, form a tight circle with your hands through which you can see your partner’s nose.
• Making sure you continue looking at your partner’s nose, bring your hands back to your face.
• When your hands touch your face, you will be looking through the circle at your partner’s nose with your dominant eye.

Eliminating Dominant Eye Problems
If at all possible, shoot from the same shoulder as their dominant eye. If it is impossible to change shoulders, always shoot with the master eye covered. A piece of tape on the shooting glasses covering the dominant eye will work. Shooting with the dominant eye covered will cause the shooter to shoot to the side of the dominant eye. Sight alignment corrections must then be made in order for the student to receive any type of success.