By: Lori Ji

18 November 2025

When I was seven, I was asked a very important question: Which Hogwarts house are you in? A brave Gryffindor, a sly Slytherin, a clever Ravenclaw, or a loyal Hufflepuff. My answer was Hufflepuff, solely because no one had answered that house, and I felt bad for it. I wondered why I couldn’t be all of them.

The notion of placing people in categories based on traits is widespread in common culture. Personality tests cover the Internet. People want to know if they are left-brained or right-brained, Gryffindor or Slytherin, what astrology sign represents them best.

Many scientific explanations and reasons for why these beliefs developed exist. For example, the concept that either a person is left-brained or right-brained has roots in science. The idea was then changed into the belief today by people. 

In the 1940s, doctors found that the procedure of cutting the corpus callosum, the bundle of nerves connecting the left and right halves of the brain, could reduce seizures in patients with epilepsy, according to Britannica. Patients still functioned mostly normally. Further examinations showed the differences between the halves of the brain and how they interacted, with the right better at spatial tasks and the left better at problem-solving and language.

This testing contributed no evidence for a divide between left and right-brained people and instead suggests people require both halves of their brain. We see these different halves or categories, and we want to place ourselves in one. People like easy, definable categories. Why?

Because it’s simple with clear answers, while life is difficult and complex. Left-brained. Right-brained. These halves provide a coping mechanism, an easy way of making sense of the world that isn’t provided through education or society. We get positive, plain answers to who we are.

A study showed that when people are more likely to accept generic descriptions of their personality over individualized characterizations, according to Britannica. Psychologists gave out fake personality tests and provided fake feedback, which people generally rated as accurate. People find the generic flattery and description attractive when talking about themselves, called the Barnum Effect. 

Plain descriptions: “charming, loyal, artistic, rational, intuitive, spontaneous.” These adjectives provide self-validation for a person, hiding the nuances and depth of someone. They are easy to accept. 

Divisions and categories are essential to human nature. They exist everywhere to help us to understand the world. We see patterns in the world, and we use them to predict and define what we see. Patterns are essential to create order. 

Groups help identify us and provide comfort and value, but they can’t represent a person. People get labeled, and their true character is obscured. Just like how left-brained, right-brained, Hogwarts houses can’t capture the complexity of a person, neither can their appearance or hobbies. 

I challenge people to see the world as it really is, without the divisions made in one’s head to explain it. The world is a mess, and that’s the beauty in it.

Britannica Editors. "Are There Really Right-Brained and Left-Brained People?". Encyclopedia Britannica, 13 Jun. 2025, https://www.britannica.com/story/are-there-really-right-brained-and-left-brained-people. Accessed 23 December 2025.