Emotion words are remembered better in the left ear.
In dichotic listening studies, numerous investigators have shown a left ear advantage (i.e., right hemisphere superiority), when judging emotional tone of speech. In the present study, dichotic word-pairs of emotion and non-emotion words were presented to participants who were instructed to recall the entire list in each block. Unlike other studies in which participants responded to emotional intonations, participants in the present investigation listened to stimuli that were spoken in a neutral intonation. A total of 62 participants listened to emotion (e.g., loving) and non-emotion (e.g., combine) words that were dichotically presented. The results showed a left ear advantage for emotion words. This finding provides strong support for the right-hemisphere hypothesis in the form of a stronger memory for emotion words presented to the left ear. The findings are consistent with the role of the right hemisphere in the perception of emotional information.