Handwriting: Techniques Used to Identify

The technique used to determine the culprit in the Lindberg kidnapping of 1932 was to look for the differences. Anyone can look at the similarities with a fair amount of accuracy but to look at the differences, especially the ones that matter, is not hard and often requires years of training and practice. Handwriting changes over they years. Also, each time you write a word, it will look different (at least some parts will). The letter's will change depending on where they are placed in the word/sentence. The trick is, the one that Osborn discovered, is what letters don't change; better yet, what parts of the word/letter don't change.

Another important thing to remember is that you have to distinguish between style characteristics and individual characteristics. Forensic Scientists want to examine the individual characteristics. Things like the sizes of the letters: width, height; the curves of the letters, the slants. Also if the letters are "slurred" together or connect. How close the words are together, or how close the letters are to other letters, the pressure put on the pencil on down strokes, upward strokes. Also the placement on the line is important. Example: if the letters on one line are so tall that they intersect with letters on the line above it. The margin left over is important as well.


PERSONALITIES IN HANDWRITING:
Does your personality match a particular personality type? You can find out about personality types here.
Typologies
There are a number of Graphologists, particularly in Europe, who subscribe to what is known as the "typological" theory of personality.
Typology experts have a particular way of categorizing personality according to special guidelines.
There are several theories of typology but the main thought behind them is that most personalities can be categorized according to type – hence the word typology. In other words a personality can be classified as belonging to a specific personality group.
As can be expected with a theory of this nature, there is always a great deal of controversy.
Typology as a helpful guide
Anti-typologists are critical of using typologies to describe people. They feel that people who use typologies are guilty of putting people into boxes.
However, those who subscribe to typological theories argue that they in no way attempt to put people into boxes. Typologies are purely to be used as helpful guides.
Be that as it may, there are a number of different schools of typology and some very important thinkers have subscribed to this line of reasoning.
Jung
Jung believed that people conformed to certain basic personality types and wrote a massive book to explain and support his theories.
He classified people into two main groups according to their personality attitudes. In fact it was Jung himself who first used the words "introverts" and "extroverts" to describe these two attitudes.
Now to these attitudes he added 4 principal functions, namely sensation, thinking, feeling and intuition. He suggested that by combining the 4 functions with the 2 attitudes we would arrive at the most important personality classifications.
ATTITUDES
Introvert
Extrovert
FUNCTIONS
Thinking
Feeling
Intuition
Sensation
For instance you could be an introverted thinker; or you could be an extroverted sensation type. Then there was an introverted intuitive type and so on. All in all, if you juggled these about, there were 16 possible permutations or personality types.
When we apply this to handwriting you'll find that the handwriting of an introvert will differ widely from that of an extrovert.
While the handwriting of an introvert will conform to certain graphological patterns the handwriting of an extrovert will conform to a completely different set of patterns.
For more on Jung's personality types Ref: Psychological Types by C.G. Jung
Myers-Briggs
The typology of Jung forms the basis of the Myers-Briggs Personality Type Indicator which is well-known among psychologists today. It also refers to 16 basic personality types and is widely used as a personality assessment tool.
Le Senne
Highly regarded among French graphologists was the French philosopher and psychologist, Le Senne. He created a typological system which divided people according to emotivity and activity.
The emotive person is someone who is easily moved by events - he shows a lot of feeling. The active person is one who translates everything into action - so that even his thinking is action orientated.
Le Senne combined his two classes of personality with people who were guided by primary or secondary responses.
Simply put, this meant that they were either impulsive (primary) or they thought about things carefully before acting