Is the left-brain/right-brain personality theory real?

The answer

The popular notion that people are dominantly 'left-brained' (logical, analytical) or 'right-brained' (creative, intuitive) is a persistent neuromyth. A definitive 2013 study at the University of Utah analyzed resting-state fMRI data from over 1,000 people aged 7-29, examining functional connectivity in 7,266 brain regions. They found no evidence that individuals preferentially use one hemisphere over the other. While certain functions do lateralize - language processing primarily involves Broca's and Wernicke's areas in the left hemisphere, and spatial attention favors the right - virtually every cognitive task requires coordinated bilateral processing through the 200-250 million nerve fibers in the corpus callosum. Creative thinking, often attributed to the right brain, actually shows increased connectivity between both hemispheres on EEG studies.