I’ll Presume You Are Not Being Honest: How spacing in handwriting may reveal deception
Have you ever received a handwritten note and formed an opinion of the writer because of how the writing looked? Or have you ever wondered to yourself, “Is there more I can tell just from the way this is written?” Or perhaps, for some reason you couldn’t quite put your finger on, you doubted whether the handwritten words you were reading were true. If you have, you are not alone. My goal is to help you identify the tiny pen movements that speak volumes in someone’s handwriting.
I am a graphologist, meaning I study the way words are written, whether by hand, foot or mouth, to identify a person’s emotional state. And to a trained graphologist, everything about the use and placement of the lines, angles, curves and spacing to create the words communicates something specific about the writer — including attempts to deceive. This is because handwriting is controlled by the brain and is a permanent snapshot of an individual’s emotional state.
The Emotional State
Ekman & Corado in 2011, leaders in the field of nonverbal communication, defined an individual’s emotions (their emotional state) to be a reflection of an emotional response to life experiences and is automatic. Any change to their emotional state will lead to a change in non-verbal behavior and results in ‘behavioral leakages’. Research by Zuckerman et al shows that when people who do not have a psychosis tell a lie, there is a change in their emotional state which is caused by an increase in the cognitive load. With the increased cognitive load, their body language begins to change which can indicate that deception is being practiced.
It is this change in nonverbal body language that interrogators and body language experts are trained to notice.
And it is this change that graphologists are trained to notice. However, unlike body and facial expressions, handwriting has the advantage of being a physical diagnostic tool for detecting a change in a person’s emotional state.
Spacing in Handwriting
One specific element of graphology that can reveal deception is the blank space on the page. What you might find fascinating is that it is extremely difficult for the writer to consciously control how much space is or is not used for margins, between lines and between words, revealing not just core personality traits, but also possible deception.
The principle behind analyzing the blank space in handwriting comes from the school of Gestalt Psychology and it’s theory of Figure-Ground Organization.
Frequently demonstrated by use of the above image, Figure-Ground Organization relates to the contrast between negative and positive space and how it is processed by the brain. Depending on how the brain thinks and reacts, either the white or black space will be seen first, but not both at the same time. If the vase is seen first and then a conscious shift must happen to observe the two faces and vice versa.
Another example of Figure-Ground Organization is the photo below. When you look at it you will either see the black chess pieces first or the blank space between the chess pieces that are in the shape of people. While there is no right or wrong for which image you see first, it is impossible for you to see both at the same time. You will have to consciously shift your perception to observe the second image.
When this Gestalt figure-ground principle is applied to handwriting, the ink becomes the positive figure space and the paper is the negative ground space ( Lowe, Sheila. Reading Between The Lines: Decoding Handwriting (Handwriting Psychology Book 2). Vanguard Publications. Kindle Edition). Most people are trained only to observe the ink (the figure). However handwriting analysts are trained to make a conscious shift from viewing the words themselves to the blank paper space (ground). This is when an entirely different picture emerges. One of the best ways to help this different picture emerge is to turn the handwriting sample upside down. As a professional graphologist, this is often the first step of an analysis as it forces me to observe the ground elements such as margins, line spacing and overall page balance rather than the words themselves.
To a trained graphologist, exaggerated spaces or unusual ground formations, are a calling card waiting to be noticed and questioned. Exaggerated spaces between words, sentences or even at the start of a new line of writing can indicate where the writer pauses to think. What happens physically when the writer pauses to collect their thoughts, is that the momentum in the writer’s hand created by the physical act of writing, keeps it moving forward even though the pen has been lifted from the page. This results in an extra large space. Graphology views this as a concrete, graphic representation of a verbal pause.
If that space is at least twice as large as usual and cannot otherwise credited to vision problems, a sense of isolation or that the following word is difficult to spell, a professional handwriting analyst may presume that you are not being completely honest.
What Science Proves
A quantitative study done in 2016 by Michelle R. Doscher (Doscher, Michelle R.(2016) Graphological Analysis: A Potential Psychodiagnostic Investigative Method for Deception Detection, Walden University ScholarWorks, Dissertation)for her doctorate dissertation in forensic science, showed that when deception is being practiced, there is a statistically significant difference in spacing discrepancies between truthful and untruthful statements. When the cognitive load is increased, then the word spacing discrepancies in untruthful statements increased by a startling 42%.
Part of Doscher’s research explored whether or not relaxation and focus affected the spacing discrepancy scores. What was discovered was that “spacing discrepancy scores increased, as the participants’ focused less on their handwriting presentation and more on describing the movie clips watched.”
Doscher’s research provides clear evidence that the psycholinguistic deceptive clues detected via verbal and non-verbal body cues carry through to handwritten statements.
So Why Does it Matter?
Let’s do a quick self-experimentation and test how your perception of spacing can alter how you interpret a written missive.
Begin by reading the text below.
Now look at it again but this time, upside down so you can pay more attention to the spacing around the words rather than the words themselves. Remember the Gestalt principle of Figure-Ground Organization? It’s easier to shift your perception to the “ground” rather than the “figure” by viewing it upside down.
When you looked at it a second time, did you notice the giant gap that appears before the word “older” on the third line and again before the word “friend” on the fourth line? If you didn’t, go back and look at it again. Once you see it, it pretty much jumps off the page, asking you to question that pause.
In light of Doscher’s research which indicated that a sudden, and otherwise unexplained increase in word spacing may imply deception, do you believe this is an honest memory or do you think this person might be deceptive about something?
It may interest you to know that when questioned, the writer confirmed that they were, in fact, being deceptive about their best friend.
I’ll Presume You are Not Being Honest
It is important to remember that detecting deception through body language is complicated and there are many reasons why someone might experience a physiological change that would be reflected in their handwriting. There are also other reasons why extra large spacing may appear consistently throughout a person’s handwriting such as vision problems or a sense of isolation. However, thanks to Doscher’s research, if you notice a sudden, uncharacteristic and marked change in someone’s word spacing, there is up to a 75% chance that they are being deceptive at that moment and you can presume they are not being honest. Ask them about what follows that exaggerated space. You might be surprised by what you find out!
The potential uses for this aspect of handwriting analysis is diverse and meaningful. As Doscher pointed out in her thesis, Police using handwriting analysis in investigations to spot deception could help to identify false confessions, cover-ups and outright lies, saving them money and time. Other uses would be for businesses to investigate corporate crime; teachers to identify when students are struggling; hiring managers to determine if someone’s being honest about their credentials and motivations.
You could also use it to determine if a financial advisor is being entirely honest or perhaps even protecting yourself from a costly romance scam or being cat fished — but only if you make a point to ask for a writing sample.
The takeaway here is that just like you pay attention to how someone dresses, what words they use and their body language, paying attention to how they write can also provide you with valuable information about an individual that could save you from harm or misunderstandings.
