Inquiry about dominant vs non dominant wrist settings

[smartnesskills]

I have a lot of disabilities and one that is most problematic is that I don’t cross the mid line. Basically my left and right side of my brain don’t communicate and as a kid I went to occupational therapy to force me to be right handed. Long story short is that I really don’t have a dominant hand. I use both about equally. I am left legged. I start with my left leg and kick with it when kicking in sports(not very athletic). What would the "correct" setting be? Would I leave it on dominant hand?

Moderator Edit: Clarified subject

[MarreFitbit]

Hi there, @smartnesskills. Welcome to the Fitbit Community Forums. Thanks for the details provided in your post and for taking the time to share those personal details. I understand where your concern is coming from, I will do my best to help you!  

I'd say, this would depend on your preference. For wrist-based devices, it's important to specify whether you wear the device on your dominant or non-dominant wrist during setup:

• The dominant wrist setting decreases the sensitivity of step counting and should reduce any over counting of steps when your body is not moving. Your dominant hand is the one you use for writing and eating.
• The non-dominant wrist setting increases the sensitivity of step counting and should reduce any under counting of steps.

My brother has a real life handedness quirk. He has mixed hand dominance. He's predominantly left handed, but he writes with his right hand. The dominant/non-dominant setting does make a difference in the sensitivity of the step tracker.

[LZeeW]

@smartnesskills   There is one bit of information that you didn't share and that is which wrist do you want to wear your watch on?  You wrote that you use both about equally, but I bet you have a hand preference for some things that are known to cause false steps.  It's in our muscle memory.  I have mixed hand dominance, so I will share how I made my decision.  It also helps that I wore a Fitbit One for a few years, a torso tracker where hands don't count.  The thing we are trying to do is reduce false steps.

I write with my right hand and have always worn my watch on my left wrist, so I wear my Fitbit on my left wrist. There are things that will cause false steps, like folding clothes, but we use both hands folding clothes.  Think about the one handed things we do that can cause false steps: brushing our teeth, constantly stirring food that is cooking, etc.  You mention that you kick with your left leg, but what about throwing a ball?  Do you actually have a preference for any of these things?  I use my left hand for all of these, so my wrist setting is dominant.

You can run your own personal experiment with your Inspire 3.  It has an on wrist/on body setting.  You can put the setting to on body and carry it in your pocket and get a baseline step count.  Then wear it on your preferred wrist and use the dominant setting for a few days and the non-dominant for a few days.  See which setting is closer to your torso steps.  I did this when I started wearing a wrist Fitbit.  If you use both hands equally, then it won't make a difference.

@MarreFitbit   You wrote, "Your dominant hand is the one you use for writing and eating."  That is straight out of Fitbit's Help article and doesn't apply to people with mixed hand dominance.

[smartnesskills]

I use a mixture of both hands. I also have problems with my fine motor skills. I think I'll just say that my dominant hand is my right since it's what I was always taught to use as my dominant.