lateral inversion

The reversal experienced by an image formed in a plane (flat) mirror. Although the image is the correct way up, its left and right sides are transposed. The impression that most people have of their own face is based on the image that they see in a mirror; however, this is quite different from the face that other people see – for example, a hair parting that appears to be on the left when viewed in a mirror is seen by everyone else to be on the right.

Police vehicles and ambulances often have laterally-inverted warning signs painted on their fronts, which appear the correct way round to a driver looking through a rear-view mirror.