The "handedness" of language: Directional symmetry breaking of sign usage in words

TL;DR

This study uncovers a universal asymmetry in sign usage at word boundaries across languages, revealing that word beginnings are less restrictive than endings, which can help infer writing directions in undeciphered scripts.

Contribution

The paper introduces a quantitative method to analyze sign asymmetry at word boundaries, demonstrating its universality across languages and its application to deciphering undeciphered inscriptions.

Findings

Word beginnings have higher sign variability than endings.

Asymmetry persists even in root words without affixes.

Method accurately infers writing direction in undeciphered scripts.

Abstract

Language, which allows complex ideas to be communicated through symbolic sequences, is a characteristic feature of our species and manifested in a multitude of forms. Using large written corpora for many different languages and scripts, we show that the occurrence probability distributions of signs at the left and right ends of words have a distinct heterogeneous nature. Characterizing this asymmetry using quantitative inequality measures, viz. information entropy and the Gini index, we show that the beginning of a word is less restrictive in sign usage than the end. This property is not simply attributable to the use of common affixes as it is seen even when only word roots are considered. We use the existence of this asymmetry to infer the direction of writing in undeciphered inscriptions that agrees with the archaeological evidence. Unlike traditional investigations of phonotactic constraints which focus on language-specific patterns, our study reveals a property valid across languages and writing systems. As both language and writing are unique aspects of our species, this universal signature may reflect an innate feature of the human cognitive phenomenon.