Graphology

 
Most of us now probably spend more time typing than we do writing with a pen or pencil between our fingers. Many, the writer included, can take pride in a page of text they have typed and formatted to their own taste, while feeling slightly embarrassed about the appearance of a page of their handwriting.
 
In the early 1970’s, there was a spike of interest in the graphology: the study of handwriting. This maintains that when we write we unknowingly leave clues about our personalities. In essence, we leave something of ourselves on the paper.
 
Major employers started to require those applying for a job to submit their applications in writing. No doubt these were submitted in the applicant’s very best handwriting, as we all recognise that others do tend to form an impression of us through our handwriting. Not to be defeated by this desire to impress, some employers designed the interview process so that an applicant, attending an interview in person, might be required to produce a page of their handwriting on the spot. For example, they were sometimes asked to make a note of a dialogue in a television programme or to copy a page of text as quickly as they could.
 
The employer would then ask a graphology expert to report as to what clues about the applicant’s character he had inadvertently revealed through his handwriting. Did he have the qualities the employer most valued?
 
At its peak, in the 1970’s, graphology claimed the status of a science but research carried out in the 1990’s dismissed it as a pseudoscience. The writer’s instinct, however, remains that ‘there is something in it’.
 
On a very simple level, the underlying principle of graphology is:
 
·        the left side of a page or pen strokes that lean to the left, represents the inner person
·        right, represents the outer world
·        up, represents spirituality or ambition
·        down, represents a rootedness in the ground or the material world.
 
The writer has often found, for example, that where someone’s handwriting leans significantly to the left, they tend to be a rather introverted person. This may be confirmed if the handwriting is small and lightly written; conversely, one only needs to look at Donald Trump’s signature to see the large letters of a large personality.
 
It is important to read a series of features of handwriting as a whole, rather than focus on one feature in isolation. For example,
 
·        if the letters are pressed hard into the page, this suggests a sense of energy or drive; when crossing the letter ‘t’ a firm, long, upward-slanting cross is a sign of ambition
·        dots placed precisely over a letter ‘I’ are probably written by a careful person, while the opposite might also be true when the dots are ‘all over the place’
·        angular strokes that join one letter to the next suggest an analytical mind, while handwriting where the overall appearance is rounded, point to a more easy-going person; where the handwriting is large and rounded this suggests generosity
·        someone who adds an unnecessary hook to their letters is likely to be stubborn.
 

Adolf Hitler’s signature

The first stroke in the letter ‘A’ of Adolf Hitler’s signature is a bold stroke from right to left and could be seen as a dagger drawn violently back into his own soul, followed by another similar stroke in the other limb of the letter ‘A’. The letter ‘H’ contains another bold line from right to left but is then softened by the long curved loop to the right; it should be remembered Hitler had a creative side and was an artist.
 
The writer recently saw the handwriting of a deeply spiritual person. Some of their letters, literally, pointed high and sharply towards Heaven, but in a gentle way with the pen clearly having touched the paper only lightly.
 
Graphology can provide interesting clues about someone’s personality but, if it is indeed a ‘pseudoscience’, it is likely to be an unreliable guide. It can be fun speculating on what our handwriting says about us. Perhaps our typing says something about us too.
 
Richard Devereux