HISTORY OF HANDWRITING ANALYSIS

Trait-stroke graphology, like psychology, was rooted in the study of philosophy. In 300 B.C., the Greek philosopher Aristotle conveyed his understanding of the relationship between handwriting and personality when he said, "Spoken words are the symbols of mental experience and written words are the symbols of spoken words. Just as all men have not the same speech sounds, so all men have not the same writing." The study of handwriting was also mentioned during the times of the Roman Empire. Tranquillus, the biographer of Augustus Caesar, wrote that the Emperor's cramped handwriting showed his stingy nature.

Beginning in Italy in the 17th century and later in France in the 19th century, handwriting strokes and letters were systematically classified by type, and an interpretation was assigned to each of the various forms. Scientific handwriting analysis, or formal trait-stroke graphology, emerged from the work of two French clergymen in the 19th century, Abbe Flandrin and Abbe Michon. Along with his students, Abbe Michon formed a professional organization, Societe Graphologique, to explore the relationship between graphology and personality. Trait-stroke graphology reflects both the process and the results of this research, where many handwriting strokes and formations were found to be correlated with personality characteristics of the writers.

During the last decade of the 19th century, German physiologists and psychiatrists concluded that handwriting is actually "Brain Writing" after observing a double amputee fluently produce his signature with his pen in his mouth. They further noted that the size, speed and pressure of a person's handwriting were unrelated to physical strength. Rather, the term "psychomotor energies" was used to describe the driving force behind a person's writing.

By the turn of the twentieth century, Alfred Binet, developer of the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Test, had taken an interest in handwriting analysis and decided to become a professional graphologist. By that time, graphology was well-established in France under the leadership of Crepieuxjamin, and in Germany under the leadership of Ludwig Klages. Klages, a German philosopher and graphologist, introduced the term "expressive movement" to describe bodily movements such as manners of walk, speech, gesture and handwriting. He pointed out that handwriting was the only one of these movements which could be preserved for study at that time. Thus, a person's writing was found to serve as a record of that individual's bodily rhythms and tensions.

In the 1930's, the English graphologist Robert Saudek examined handwriting movements by microscope, film, and pressure board. Over 100,000 men, women and children of all nationalities were studied, and correlations between traits and strokes were documented. During the same decade at the Harvard University Psychological Clinic, Gordon Allport and Philip Vernon also noted, after laboratory work with many subjects, that an individual's movements, writing or other, are consistent and may be considered as personal expression. In Budapest, Klara Roman conducted research which subjected graphology to clinical testing involving the use of a Graphodyne to measure the speed and pressure of writing movements. A sample of 2,000 public school children between the ages of 11-18 (along with a control group of approximately 600 school children) were studied over a period of 8 years to determine the degree of relationship between writing speed, pressure and the process of maturation.

Presently, the incidence of use of handwriting analysis around the world is quite high (Hirsh, 1987). In 1992, Smith and Abrahamson reviewed methods of personnel selection in six European countries between 1983 and 1991 and found increasingly frequent use of graphology for the selection and promotion of key employees (particularly in France). Sharma and Vardhan (1985) suggest that 85% of European selection decisions may involve the use of graphology, and Klimoski and Rafaeli found in 1983 that over 3000 companies in the United States retained handwriting analysts. Accredited universities such as the New School for Social Research and Northwestern University have offered approved courses in graphology within their respective psychology departments. The Library of Congress officially places graphology under the classifications of Individual Psychology (155.282), Documentary Evidence (363.25fx5), and Selection of Personnel by Management (658.3112).