graphology - The Skeptic's Dictionary

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> <head><title>graphology - The Skeptic's Dictionary - Skepdic.com</title> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" /> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="_style/style.css" /> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="_style/printstyle.css" media="print"/> <link rel="shortcut icon" href="s1.ico"> <script>(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.0"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));</script>  <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=ra-5487a05a7e027f30" async="async"></script>  </head> <body><br /> <div class="container"> <div class="header"> <div class="logo"> <img src="_images/logo_01.png" alt="The Skeptic's Dictionary" width="270" height="60" border="0" />           <br /> by <a href="http://skepdic.com/refuge/bio.html">Robert Todd Carroll</a> * est. 1994 </div> <div class="slogan"> <img src="_images/slogan_01.gif" alt="A Collection of Strange Beliefs, Amusing Deceptions, and Dangerous Delusions" width="362" height="30" /> </div> </div> <div class="menu"> <ul> <li></li><li><a href="http://skepdic.com/">Home</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/news/">Newsletter</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/feedback.html">Feedback</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/faq.html">FAQ & Interviews</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/tour.html">Site Map</a></li> </ul> </div> <div class="middle"> <div class="left"> <h2>Topical Indexes</h2> <ul class="nav_1"> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/tialtmed.html">Alternatives to Medicine</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/ticriticalthinking.html">Critical Thinking</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/ticrypto.html">Cryptozoology</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/tialien.html">ETs & UFOs</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/tifraud.html">Frauds, Hoaxes, Conspiracies</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/tijunk.html">Junk Science</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/tilogic.html">Logic & Perception</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/tinewage.html">New Age</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/tipara.html">Paranormal</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/tiscience.html">Science & Philosophy</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/tisuper.html">Supernatural</a></li> <li> </li> </ul> <h2>Other Writings</h2> <ul class="nav_2"> <li> <a href="http://59ways.blogspot.com/">Unnatural Acts blog</a></li> <li><a href="skeptimedia/skeptimediaarchive.html">Skeptimedia</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/refuge/funkarchive.html"> Mass Media Funk</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/refuge/bunkarchive.html"> Mass Media Bunk</a></li> <li><a href="refuge/harmarchive.html">What's the Harm?</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/news/">Newsletter Archives</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/refuge/wwwbunk.html"> Internet Bunk</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/refuge/2good.html"> Too good to be true</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/refuge/essays.html"> Skeptical Essays</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/refuge/randr.html"> Book Reviews</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/refuge/suburbanmyths.html"> Suburban Myths</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/refuge/memoriam.html"> In Memoriam</a></li><li></li> </ul> <h2>Other Resources</h2> <ul class="nav_3"> <li><a href="http://sd4kids.skepdic.com"> Mysteries and Science for Kids</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/hollow.html">A Skeptic's Halloween</a></li> <li> <a href="http://renish.skepdic.com/AllNotes.html">Editor's Notes</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/refuge/getinvolved.html"> Get involved</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/future.html">Future Topics?</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/permissions.html"> Permission to print</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/report/">Site Statistics</a></li><li></li> </ul> </div> <div class="content"> <div class="it"> <h2>From Abracadabra to Zombies<span class="small"> | <a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html">View All</a></span></h2> <ul class="alphabet"> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#A">a</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#B">b</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#C">c</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#D">d</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#E">e</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#F">f</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#G">g</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#H">h</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#I">i</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#J">j</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#K">k</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#L">l</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#M">m</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#N">n</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#O">o</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#P">p</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#Q">q</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#R">r</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#S">s</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#T">t</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#U">u</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#V">v</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#W">w</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#X">x</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#Y">y</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/contents.html#Z">z</a></li> </ul> <webContent><h1>graphology (graphoanalysis)</h1> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3">Graphology (graphoanalysis) is the study of handwriting, especially when employed as a means of analyzing character and personality traits. Real handwriting experts are known as <em>forensic document examiners</em>, not as <em>graphologists</em>. <a href="http://www.asqde.org/"> Forensic (or questioned) document examiners</a> consider loops, dotted "i's" and crossed "t's," letter spacing, slants, heights, ending strokes,  etc. They examine handwriting to detect authenticity or forgery. </font> </p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3">Graphologists, or graphoanalyists, examine loops, dotted "i's" and crossed "t's," letter spacing, slants, heights, ending strokes, upslant pressure, downslant pressure, etc., but they believe that such handwriting minutiae are physical manifestations of  <a href="unconscious.html">unconscious mental functions</a>. Graphologists believe such details can reveal as much about a person as <a HREF="astrolgy.html">astrology </a>, <a href="palmist.html">palm reading</a>,  <a HREF="psychomet.html">psychometry,</a> <a href="rumpology.html">rumpology</a>, or the <a HREF="myersb.html">Myers-Briggs</a> personality type indicator. However, there is no evidence that the unconscious mind is a reservoir of truth about a person, much less that graphology provides a gateway to that reservoir.</font></p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3">Graphology is claimed to be useful for everything from understanding health issues, morality and past experiences to hidden talents and mental problems.<a href="http://www.viewzone.com/handwriting.html">*</a> However, "in properly controlled, blind studies, where the handwriting samples contain no content that could provide non-graphological information upon which to base a prediction (e.g., a piece copied from a magazine), graphologists do no better than chance at predicting... personality traits...." ["The Use of Graphology as a Tool for Employee Hiring and Evaluation," from the <a href="http://www.bccla.org/positions/privacy/88graphology.html">British Columbia Civil Liberties Association</a>] And even non-experts are able to correctly identify the <em>gender</em> of a writer about 70% of the time (Furnham, 204).</font></p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3">There are a variety of techniques used by graphologists.<a href="http://web.singnet.com.sg/~tjlow/graphology/grapho.htm">*</a> Even so, the techniques of these "experts" seem to be reducible to impressions from such things as the pressure exerted on the page, spacing of words and letters, crossed t's, dotted i's, size, slant, speed and consistency of writing. Though graphologists deny it, the <em>content</em> of the writing is one of the more important factors in graphological character assessment. The content of a message, of course, is independent of the handwriting and should be irrelevant to the assessment.</font></p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3">Barry Beyerstein (1996) considers many of the notions of graphologists to be little more than <a href="sympathetic.html">sympathetic magic</a>, e.g., the notion that leaving wide spaces between letters indicates a proneness to isolation and loneliness because the wide spaces indicate someone who does not mix easily and is uncomfortable with closeness. One graphologist claims that a person betrays his sadistic nature if he crosses his t's with lines that look like whips. </font> </p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3">Since there is no useful theory as to how graphology might work, it is not surprising that there is no empirical evidence that any graphological characteristics significantly correlate with any interesting personality trait. (Though see <a href="http://skepdic.com/comments/graphcom.html">reader comments</a> from Brian Hales for a discussion of engineering quirks in handwriting.)</font> </p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3">Adrian Furnham writes:</font></p> <blockquote> <p><font face="Arial" size="3"><strong style="font-weight: 400">Readers familiar with the techniques of <a HREF="coldread.html">cold reading</a> will be able to understand why graphology appears to work and why so many (otherwise intelligent) people believe in it. [p. 204]</strong></font></p> </blockquote> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3">Add to cold reading, <a href="barnum.html">the Barnum effect</a>, <a href="confirmbias.html">confirmation bias</a>, <a HREF="communalreinforcement.html">communal reinforcement</a>, <a href="forer.html">the Forer effect,</a> and <a href="subjectivevalidation.html">subjective validation</a> and you have a fairly complete explanation for graphology's popularity. </font> </p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3">Graphology is another pipe dream of those who want a quick and dirty decision making process to tell them who to marry, who did the crime, who they should hire, what career they should seek, where the good hunting is, where the water, oil, or buried treasure is, etc. Graphology is another in a long list of quack substitutes for hard work. It is appealing to those who are impatient with such troublesome matters as research, evidence analysis, reasoning, logic, and hypothesis testing. If you want results and you want them now and you want them stated in strong, certain terms, graphology is for you. If, however, you can live with reasonable probabilities and uncertainty, you might try another method to pick a spouse or hire an employee.</font></p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3">If on the other hand, you don't mind discriminating against people on the basis of pseudoscientific non-sense, then at least have the consistency to use a <a href="ouija.html"> Ouija board</a> to help you pick the right graphologist.</font></p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3"><b>See also</b> <a HREF="crystals.html">crystal power</a>, <a HREF="palmist.html">palmistry</a>, <a HREF="polygrap.html">polygraph </a>and <a href="inkblot.html">Rorschach test</a>, "</font><a href="http://skepdic.com/refuge/funk58.html"><font size="3">How FBI profilers resemble graphologists</font></a><font face="Arial" size="3">".</font></p> <hr align="left" noshade width="25%"> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3"><b><a HREF="comments/graphcom.html">reader comments</a></b> </font> </p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3"><b>further reading</b> </font> </p> <p align="left"><b><font size="3">books and articles</font></b></p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0879756551/roberttoddcarrolA/">Basil, Robert. "Graphology and Personality: `Let the Buyer Beware'," in <i>The Hundredth Monkey and Other Paradigms of the Paranormal</i>, ed. Kendrick Frazier (Buffalo, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1991), pp. 206-208.</a> </font> </p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3"><a HREF="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=1573920215/roberttoddcarrolA/">Beyerstein, Barry. "Graphology," in <i>The Encyclopedia of the Paranormal </i>edited by Gordon Stein (Buffalo, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1996), pp. 309-324.</a> </font> </p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3"> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0879756136/roberttoddcarrolA/">Beyerstein, Barry and Dayle F. Beyerstein, editors, <i>The Write Stuff - Evaluations of Graphology, the Study of Handwriting Analysis</i> (Buffalo, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1991).</a> </font> </p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0879756551/roberttoddcarrolA/">Furnham, Adrian. "Write and Wrong: The Validity of Graphological Analysis," in <i>The Hundredth Monkey and Other Paradigms of the Paranormal</i>,ed. Kendrick Frazier (Buffalo, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1991), pp. 200-205.</a> </font> </p> <p align="left"><font face="Arial" size="3"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0486203948/roberttoddcarrolA/">Gardner, Martin. <i>Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science</i> (New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1957), ch. 24.</a> </font> <p align="left"><font size="3"><b>websites</b></font></p> <p style="text-align: left"> <font face="Arial" size="3"> <a href="http://www.sfu.ca/~beyerste/research/articles/09GraphologyChapter.pdf"> Graphology</a> from the <i>Encyclopedia of the Paranormal</i> by Barry Beyerstein</font></p> <p style="text-align: left"> <font face="Arial" size="3"> <a href="http://www.pbs.org/safarchive/3_ask/archive/qna/3282_bbeyerstein.html"> Ask the Scientists - Barry Beyerstein on the abuse of graphology</a></font></p> <p style="text-align: left"><font face="Arial" size="3"><a href="refuge/funk3.html#graphology">Mass Media Funk</a> - Barry Beyerstein and Alan Alda on graphology</font></p> <p style="text-align: left"><font face="Arial" size="3"><a href="refuge/bunk6.html">Mass Media Bunk - graphology</a></font></p> <p style="text-align: left"><font face="Arial" size="3"><a href="refuge/bunk2.html#graphology">Mass Media Bunk - more graphology</a></font></p> <p style="text-align: left"><font face="Arial" size="3"><a href="http://sex.tant.de/">Graphological Gender Testing</a> A humorous application of this "science".</font></p> <p style="text-align: left"><font face="Arial" size="3"><a href="http://www.asqde.org/">The American Society of Questioned Document Examiners</a></font></p> <p style="text-align: left"><font face="Arial" size="3">"The Use of Graphology as a Tool for Employee Hiring and Evaluation," from the <a href="http://www.bccla.org/positions/privacy/88graphology.html">British Columbia Civil Liberties Association</a></font></p> <p></webContent>Last updated </p> 26-Apr-2015 </div> </div> <div class="right"> <div class="right_it"> <div class="search"> <form method="get" action="http://www.google.com/custom" target="_top"> <input type="hidden" name="domains" value="skepdic.com" /> <input type="text" name="q" maxlength="255" value="" size="20" /> <input type="submit" name="sa" value="Search" /> <br /> <div class="search_2"> <input type="radio" name="sitesearch" value="" /> Web     <input type="radio" name="sitesearch" value="skepdic.com" checked="checked" /> Skepdic.com <br /> <img src="_images/logo_google.gif" alt="Google" width="48" height="19" /> </div> <input type="hidden" name="client" value="pub-3542920166946725" /> <input type="hidden" name="forid" value="1" /> <input type="hidden" name="ie" value="ISO-8859-1" /> <input type="hidden" name="oe" value="ISO-8859-1" /> <input type="hidden" name="cof" value="GALT:#008000;GL:1;DIV:#336699;VLC:663399;AH:center;BGC:FFFFFF;LBGC:336699;ALC:0000FF;LC:0000FF;T:000000;GFNT:0000FF;GIMP:0000FF;FORID:1;" /> <input type="hidden" name="hl" value="en" /> </form> </div> <div class="center"> <p align="right"><a href="http://skepdic.com/authorpage.html"><strong>Books by R. T. Carroll </strong></a></p> <p align="right"><a href="http://skepdic.com/authorpage.html"><img src="http://skepdic.com/graphics/CTDcover140.jpg" alt="cover The Critical Thinker's Dictionary" width="140" height="212" /></a></p> <div align="right"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0471272426/roberttoddcarrolA/"> <img src="_images/book_01.jpg" alt="The Skeptic's Dictionary" border="0" width="140" height="171" /></a> </div> </div> <h2 align="center" class="right_it">OTHER LANGUAGES</h2> <ul class="nav_4"> <li><a href="http://nederlands.skepdic.com/">Dutch</a><br /> <a href="http://sdkinderen.skepdic.com/">Dutch voor kinderen</a></li> <li><a href="http://dictionnaire.sceptiques.qc.ca/">French</a> </li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.com/German/morgenwelt.html">German</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepdic.gr/">Greek</a></li> <li><a href="http://www.szabadgondolkodo.hu/szkeptikus/szotar/">Hungarian</a></li> <li><a href="http://www.vantru.is/efahyggjuordabokin/">Icelandic</a></li> <li><a href="http://italiano.skepdic.com/">Italian</a></li> <li><a href="http://www.genpaku.org/skepticj/">Japanese</a></li> <li><a href="http://www.rathinker.co.kr/skeptic/">Korean</a></li> <li><a href="http://brazil.skepdic.com/">Portuguese</a> <br /> <a href="http://skepdic.ru/">Russian</a></li> <li><a href="http://slovnik.skepdic.com/">Slovak</a></li> <li><a href="http://skepticus.org/dicc/">Spanish</a><br /> <a href="http://www.vof.se/skepdic/"> Swedish</a><br /> <a href="http://turkish.skepdic.com/">Turkish</a></li> </ul> <p>Print versions available in <a href="http://www.lannoo.be/content/lannoo/wbnl/listview/1/index.jsp?titelcode=24816&fondsid=8" >Dutch</a>, <a href="http://skepdic.com/russian.html" >Russian</a>, <a href="http://www.rakkousha.co.jp/info/index.html#2" > Japanese</a>, and <a href="http://www.aladdin.co.kr/shop/wproduct.aspx?isbn=8995876441" >Korean</a>.</p> </div> </div> </div> <div class="footer"> <a href="gordonjay.html"> <font face="Arial" size="1"> <img src="graphics/larrow.gif" alt="larrow.gif (1051 bytes)" border="0" align="bottom" width="14" height="26"> </font> Gordon, Jay</a>  |  <a href="guasha.html"> gua sha <img src="graphics/rarrow.gif" alt="rarrow.gif (1048 bytes)" border="0" align="bottom" width="13" height="26"></a></div> </div> <div class="bottom">漏 Copyright 1994-2016 Robert T. Carroll * This page was designed by <a href="http://www.cristianpopa.com/portfolio-2/">Cristian Popa</a>.</div> </body> </html>

CINXE.COM

graphology - The Skeptic's Dictionary - Skepdic.com