Basically, it’s just what we’re testing for; I don’t think it’s what Cecil denied. Cecil denied that handwriting predicts personality, not identity. Do you see the distinction?
Dang. I missed it. Thought I had read everything on page 1, but I guess not. Anyway, part of your original post is:
But, let me reiterate, the test as proposed will not demonstrate that claim. The test will demonstrate that Bill H. can (or can’t) match handwriting samples to individuals, but it gives no indication as to personality traits. Perhaps the use of graphological principles to match handwriting to individual is interesting enough to test, but the experiment won’t test the core claim of identifying personality traits.
Additionally, I still disagree with you about the “control” test. If Bill H. performs, it’s based on some level of skill (possibly, but not necessarily, in personality analysis), and that can’t be quantified, so the proposed control really is not a control. Consider this rather silly analogy: Bill H. claims to have the ability to, more often than not, sink a basket from the free throw line. Being skeptical, we arrange to test this. As a control, we pick a random high school kid to undertake the same test. How is this an adequate control over a relatively short-lived test? If hitting a free throw really is a skill (as opposed to just random luck), we don’t know if the kid has some moderate skill, or is pretty coordinated and a quick learner. We don’t know how difficult this skill may be to pick up. We don’t know how much knowledge the kid may get by observing Bill H. warm up. We don’t know how making a basket is accomplished. So, when all’s said and done, what does the addition of the control add to the test?
Back to the graphology experiment: Let’s assume that Bill H. does well in the experiment. How will knowing his reasons for matching samples versus the control’s reasons demonstrate anything? Bill H. could claim, quite reasonably, that in his reasoning, the control is misinterpreting personality traits as (say) physical traits. The control could claim, also quite reasonably, that Bill H. is misinterpreting physical traits as personality traits. If the control does poorly, that means the skill is non-intuitive. If the control does well, that means the skill is easy to learn. So, no matter what the control’s result, we have no more information about the validity of the test. What, then, does the addition of the control add to the test?
Yes it will. The only thing Bill H has to go on is personality traits, as observed on this message board. If he can match samples to individuals, it’s because he knows the individuals’ personalities.
It’s more than that. What’s hard is identifying or even defining personality traits, in any objectively meaningful way. And yes, then you’d have to quantify them, and distinguish them, and define what you mean by “So-and-so is somewhat creative” or “Whosis is more tenacious than Whatsis”. And none of that is easy, or has been accomplished yet. I know there are lots of standard “personality tests” out there, but they’re really only a very small step above phrenology or those dippy “Are You And Your Mate Compatible?” tests in the women’s magazines at the checkout line of the grocery store. “Personality” is not really quantifiable (at least not yet), and therefore not measurable in any objective or empirical way. Which (from your post) I think you would agree with.
Perhaps you should reread the post in question. Dex used the example of blacks and crime as an example, to demonstrate the absurdity of using phrases like “tend to”; he never called Bill H. “racist” or even implied it, and to get even the impression that Dex was accusing Bill H. of racism one would have to “read” the post without paying much attention to its content.
As for asking me to “lay off it”, I’m sorry, but I’ll continue to say what I want to say if and when I have something I want to say. If the moderators decide that this thread is henceforth going to be devoted only to people who agree with each other, and be off limits to any opposing points of view, I’m sure they’ll let me know; in the meantime, your “useful learning experience” might actually have to include viewpoints different from your own. Adjust to it.
Disagree. First of all, in the experiment as proposed, Bill H. carries on an extensive email conversation with the test subjects. No limits, as far as I know, are put on what he can ask (which is not unreasonable, by the way). How can you conclude that matching samples are done on the basis of personality traits as opposed to physical or social criterion? How do you conclude that “personality traits” are “the only thing Bill H has to go on”? For example, I could imagine differences in handwriting because of:
Sex. Seems like males and females tend to write differently.
Athleticism. Will people who are physically stronger (with a stronger grip) write differently?
Handedness. Seems like left-handers would write differently.
Literacy. The more you write, the more practiced-looking it becomes, right?
Hand skills. Might not someone who does a lot of knitting, say, write differently than someone who does brick-laying?
Physical size/weight. Slim fingers? Stubby fat fingers?
Job type. Doctors, anyone? Other professions where quick scrawling of short notes is valuable? Or, conversely, draftsmen?
And that’s just off the top of my head. Do I have any evidence that any of these affect handwriting? No. But they seem just as plausible as matching criteria as personality traits would be.
Whoops. I missed that bit. Sorry. Proceed as you were, folks.
It’s wonderful to see people settling something like this with a proper test.
A couple of notes: get a clear statement of what result’ll mean what. Eg. “If Bill’s performance has a less than 5% chance of happening if he chose randomly, everyone’ll admit he can (probably) identify people from their handwriting, presumably via their personality. If Bill claims the samples are too similar to tell apart, the test tells us nothing. If Bill is confident he has identified everyone, but does no better than random, he has not demonstrated any ability, either due to not knowing the people well enough, there being no correlation between handwriting and personality, Bill not being any good at it, having a bad day, etc.”
We need a statititian to play with the numbers to figure out what % success rate is meaningful and how big a sample needed for that to be possible. (Is there any point to looking for near matches? For instance if Bill misidentifies people as each other a lot, or says A is Doper1 or Doper2. WAG: I think that’d be too complicated for this test.)
The too-similar people is a problem. Going to the other forums is an obvious idea (maybe approaching people by email??). Would it be possible to do something like: some Dopers get a co-worker to submit a sample, and we see if Bill can choose the Doper’s samples as opposed to the others. It’d be a lot worse test, but might be better than nothing. (The other people would have to be chosen deterministically, eg. random person in phone book, MiL, etc, else people’s judgements of the person’s personality might skew everything. Not sure how this’d work)
I would offer to be a testee, but I have a number of exams around now, and can’t devote the time (I’m revising now, honest). Wishing you all luck.
zut:
Your objections can be answered by requiring that all discussions be made public after the test is completed.
I’ve given this a lot of thinking. And I’ve decided (for the moment at least) to retract my consent to participate.
[list=a]
[li]I didn’t extend an offer to do this; I was asked to do it. And though I had some serious reservations, and though I realized it would be a very large time sump, I agreed thinking it would offer some real scientifc proof of something, and would be a fun time amongst friends.[/li][li]There are some serious concerns that we’ve gone over including similarities of handwriting and my ability to detect personality traits via email.[/li][li]Of the three or four people (+ me) who have put together the basic set of rules up till this point, two of them have flat out said they won’t accept the results as valid. Even after I pointed this out, Archernar has not indicated any change in position, and though C K Dexter Haven was generous enough to apologize for his insulting tone, he made no indication that his thoughts on the validity of this test had changed.[/li][li]The whole tone of this thing has gone decidedly away from “a fun time amongst friends”. That’s not the point of the experiment mind you; I expect to see a set of tests planned, executed and analyzed from an objective scientific point of view. But I’m not interested in bleeding for this. I’ve got enough pain in my life already, thank you very much.[/li][li]This whole thing is completely diluting the OP which is: Cecil says he knows of 200+ “objective scientific studies” on the ability of “graphology as a predictor of personality,” each proving it “worthless” (his words). Great, I want to read them. Where are they? And I’m not asking DDG, who was kind enough to provide her own list. If I have a question on an article in the San Jose Mercury News (as an example), I can and do write to the author and they’ll typically respond to me. In the case of the Straight Dope, this is the appointed channel by the Chicago Reader to get responses. No response? That’s fine too; Cecil doesn’t owe me crap. But I’d appreciate it, and this is my request for it.[/li][/list=a]
Jennifer McIlwee Myers wrote
This is a very interesting question. First though, as it is pretty tangental, I’d appreciate if you could reask as a seperate post, where I’ll be happy to participate more fully.
But my short answer is this: If someone presented just one serious study which qualified as:
[ul]
[li]objective[/li][li]scientific[/li][li]reasonably extensive[/li][li]specific to handwriting analysis as a predictor of personality[/li][li]not sponsored by anyone with a strong bias against the usage of handwriting analysis[/li][/ul]
and in fact it came to the conclusion that the prediction ability was no better then random, it would change my thinking considerably.
I guess I’m not clear why this is so controversial. Of course your personality can be reflected in your handwriting, the same way it can be reflected in your appearance. Having graphologists in court still seems a bit over the top for me though. Nobody should go to prison as the result of their handwriting … with the exception of people over 17 who still dot "i"s with little hearts. They, of course, should be locked away for a long, long time.
The part of the article that seems strangest to me is that forensic handwriting experts … the ones that determine if two samples of writing came from the same person … have not been subjected to scientific rigor. Can that be possible? How do they set themselves up as experts if they don’t have to pass some kind of test?
Irishman wrote
Of every post here (my own included), DDG seems to be the only participant who has actually researched the OP. And she deserves credit for that. But… The two cites were not relevant for the reasons I posted (twice; I won’t kill disk space by making it thrice). So therefore, the supporting cites for those cites are not relevant.
But more to the point about posting the bibliography of a cite: giving a list of studies does not make them relevant or accurate. Especially as they are completely unreviewed. And the fact that they are extensive, and not one of them has been reviewed makes presenting them a filibuster at best, and a diversion at worst. Say I said to you
What do you say in response?
C K Dexter Haven made this point a few times, and at the time he posted, I was not pleased with the post tone, so I discarded the valid question:
Absolutely. But the nature of human beings is that some are more detail-oriented or more creative than the average. If you compare a professional hairdresser and a professional physicist (compare them, not their handwriting), you will find that in fact they do have different qualities that suited them to their chosen role. You will find for example that the physicist is more detail oriented, and that the hairdresser is more creative. That’s not to say the physicist isn’t creative and vice-versa, but they do have different personalities. There are inner qualities that guide one person to a career as a physicist and another as a hairdresser. And in fact each would be completely unsuited for the other’s life. Those “inner qualities” are what I mean as “personality.”
And… There are characteristics of a physicists handwriting which on average are the same as other physicists, and different from the norm. If you find ten physicists, I can tell you traits you’ll see in each one of their handwritings.
Oh, and to head off the point that some physicists are actually hairdressers on the side, and vice-versa: of course. But we’re talking about statistical averages here.
If by “the topic of graphology” we can agree that what we’re talking about is “drawing significant, correct perceptions about an individual’s personality solely on the basis of his handwriting (and not on the contents of what he has written or any other factors)”, then I’d begin to think there MIGHT POSSIBLY be something to it if there were one properly conducted, well documented study in which a significantly large statistical sample met with a high degree of solid, verifiable success (at least 5000 test cases, with at least an 85% or 90% rate of success). The methodology for the testing would have to be extremely rigorous, since we’re dealing with people here, meaning a good potential for fraud and a very high possibility of personal subjectivity influencing the results. The success rate would have to be very high, because of the enormous difficulty of quantifying slippery notions like “personality traits”. There would have to be a firm theoretical background describing cause-and-effect in non-mushy terms (i.e. what handwriting characteristics mapped to what personality traits and why), and very precisely defined terminology (enormously better than gaseous phrases like “a tendency to be creative”) describing what was being tested for and what constituted a “hit”. The traits being tested for would have to be demonstrably present in some of the subjects and demonstrably absent from others. There are probably other criteria I’m missing, but the point is that without a degree of rigor at least as good as what I’ve described, it wouldn’t be a science experiment, it would be just more Human Resources-type pud-pulling.
A score of such studies, conducted with widely varying populations writing in widely varying languages – including a good sampling in each case of people for whom the tested language was not their native language – and showing consistently positive results would start to tip the scale for me from “might possibly be something to it” to “seems that there probably is something to it”.
Personally, I have strong doubts that a study of sufficient rigor to be rightly called “science” could be achieved, though I admit that merely because I can’t at the moment imagine how true scientific precision could be applied to such a situation, it doesn’t mean that nobody could do it, ever. In addition, I should also say that the entire field of experimental psychology, as I understand it today, is at best a very fuzzy borderline science, bearing somewhat the same relationship to actual science that tenth-century alchemy bears to modern chemistry. If you can’t quantify it, with precision, it isn’t science; it’s opinion, or mysticism, or jackleg trial-and-error methodology.
I will point out that the change I proposed to the rules was not accepted. You said you would be willing to match identity, but not personality test results. So, I don’t consider myself as having put together the basic set of rules. Really, my objection was based on the test setup, and not on a desire to obstruct it.
Well, yes- “handedness” for sure, at least I’d guess 90%+. But “literacy”? No way. I am about as “lierate” as tests will show- and my ahndwriting is extremely poor. Now, if we asked someone to compose a letter, as opposed to simply copying it, then yes.
However, I would not 100% rule out any correlation between handwriting and any “personality traits”. I could see some “tends to” developing, sure. But like I said- graphology as used for employment is testing for “honesty” not just being “outgoing”. They don’t need to test handwriting for being “outgoing”- they just interview the applicant.
In fairness, I haven’t actually read any of Dr. Cobweb’s posts after his first gave away his intentions, but I did happen to catch this, which I thought was informative:
He is, of course, entitled to his opinion. But it doesn’t match that of the professional (or academic) community. at all.
It’s interesting that someone would start a post with the words “in fairness” and then use an ellipsis in place of 38 words comprising a sentence and a half of explanation, thereby gutting the quoted passage of a major portion of its qualification, meaning and intention.
In fairness, I’ve read every word Bill H. has written in this thread, more than once, even after his initial post signaled his intentions and his subsequent posts demonstrated his bias and his unwillingness to explore or even admit the legitimacy of the mountain of evidence arrayed against his position.
And the use of phrases like “the professional (or academic) community” without qualifiers is merely another verbal scam. What professional community? What academic community? Is the assertion being made that there is only one “professional” and “academic” community, and that all members of this (honkin’ big) “community” are in agreement? Sheer amphigory and verbal sleight-of-hand.
I know several people with advanced degrees in psychology, some of whom are practicing therapists and others who are academics involved in research, and all of them admit that experimental psychology is at most a science in its infancy, with a very long way to go before it achieves the rigorous quantitative and mathematical underpinnings of (for example) astronomy or chemistry. I’ll have to ask them when they were kicked out of the “professional and academic community”, since Bill H. (of the graphology community) has decided they don’t belong.
[THE BELOW IS WILDLY OFF-TOPIC AND YOU MAY WISH TO THEREFORE SKIP IT]
What is the terminology here for going off-topic with a vengeance? I’m going to do it. If I’m supposed to start a threat elsewhere instead, someone let me know where it is appropriate to do so
Bill H quoted Dr. Cobweb as saying
the entire field of experimental psychology (…) isn’t science; it’s opinion, or mysticism, or jackleg trial-and-error methodology.
Dr Cobweb then said
I know several people with advanced degrees in psychology, some of whom are practicing therapists and others who are academics involved in research, and all of them admit that experimental psychology is at most a science in its infancy, with a very long way to go before it achieves the rigorous quantitative and mathematical underpinnings of (for example) astronomy or chemistry. I’ll have to ask them when they were kicked out of the “professional and academic community”, since Bill H. (of the graphology community) has decided they don’t belong.
And I would say:
Research psychology may have a long way to go, but it has also come a long way. In fact, it may be the only branch of psychology that has passed its infancy. While it is possible that several people with advanced degrees in psychology are unaware that rigourous psychological research and experimentation has been going on for quite a while, they may be speaking of the fact that social psychology and similar areas of rigourous psych research have long been ignored or denigrated by the clinical community, since the findings of research and social psych often conflict with the historical tenets of clinical treatment.
Nonetheless, rigourous psychological research has been going on, often ignored, right under the post-Freudian noses of clinical psychologists for decades. Social psychology doesn’t deal in motives or the unconscious, just in monitoring actual actions, using experiments to isolate causes for those actions.
I recently dragged out an old textbook for another topic (“How come white people don’t all look alike.”) – Social Psychology (sixth edition) by David G. Myers (no relation), 1999. I’d have to quote pages to give a realistic picture of the state of the art in social psych (and how long that state has existed), however, if you happen to have access to a copy at your library, I would suggest checking out pages 19 to 33 for an overview of the use of various forms of data gathering and the use of the scientific method in this field.
Rigour has been clearly demonstrated in this area in the journals that I gave cites for above as well as those I gave cites for in that other thread I started yesterday.
Caveats: I would agree that psychology and psychiatry are overall very much sciences in their infancy. The fact that there have been people pursuing these sciences at a high level of rigour for a long time has not prevented a lot of remarkable bad sciences and poorly-done, anecdote-based research from being favored in both clinical practice and the media. In fact, I have a friend who is a research psychologist one of whose studies was taken up by the media and reported as proving the opposite of what the results actually implied. This does not, however, change the fact that rigourous research is and has been going on.
Much of the widely accepted psychological research (the stuff actually applied to patients) has been done using case studies and experience from clinical practice, where the diagnostician, the treating “doctor” and the declaration of failure or success come from the same person.
In fact, I would state that psychology is now in a position where medicine was during the period where germ theory was well-accepted and vaccinations and other medical wonders of real science existed, but physicians still bled patients regularly because they “knew” it worked.
Nonetheless, it is not so much the research that is behind, but rather the abandonment of the disproved and the useless in favor of the proven and the useful that is lagging.
Full disclosure [Even More Off-Topic): As a high-functioning autistic (person with Asperger’s Syndrome), I was diagnosed with many kinds of neuroses and psychological ills before I worked very hard to find doctors competent to evaluate whether I had from a neurological disorder, as it turned out I do. Multiple psychological professionals diagnosed me confidently with mentally, not physically, caused ills without any thought that there could be bio-chemical and neurological problems afoot. I would like to bludgeon several of them with brick, especially since I have seen and learned about the damage that completely unscientific diagnoses and treatment have done to autistic persons of every level of functioning over the years.
Back to being on-topic – or at least, to what I think is probably pretty well related to the original question. On the other hand, I’ve been told elsewhere that I approach issues like this in really weird ways and have a tendency to wander to where only I see the connection . . . .
Bill H, you feel that my discussion of belief perserverance and questions about what it would take to convince you and the others here of the truth/falsehood of graphology are not on topic. I felt I was responding very directly to the two lines of discussion: (1) Where are the 200 studies? and (2) how would one perform a viable ad-hoc study on the topic?
For example, your initial skeptical rxn to Mr. Adams’s answer was based on doing a web search for the 200 studies and coming up with none. This would suggest to me that your belief perseverance is so severe as to obviate your interest in doing what would be necessary actually find any such studies. Either than or maybe you are just kinda naive about what the Internet actually has to offer us.
Contrary to popular belief, the Internet is not the repository of all human knowledge. It is the repostitory of two things: (1) whatever someone feels like putting on a web site and (2) lots and lots o’ p*orn. There may well be 200+ studies on graphology that are readily available for reading, but the chance of them being online is only as
good as the passionate need of someone to share them with those people who can’t get to a decent university library. And the passionate need has to be accompanied by lack of interest in copyright law.
Pretty much no-one is going to be able to post 200 links to good abstracts of 200 such studies, as the chance that they’d be online sucks. Hitting a university library and shanghaing a librarian is the way to find studies published in well-adjudicated journals. The cites could then be posted and y’all can go out and read them.
At any rate, the lack of readily available links to such studies doesn’t prove or disprove anything. Heck, it takes more than a little rather specialized knowledge and time to do this kind of research online.
And I still feel it is on-topic here to discuss what level of evidence is likely to be actually effective. However, if someone actually wants to discuss the stuff I brought up outside of the issue of graphology (not bloody likely, eh?), I’d be glad to start a new thread wherever it is most appropriate to do so.