First  part  

Graphology: What the slants in handwriting analysis tell about parental affiliation ©

Adva Weinerman, CGA. Ph.D. 20-4-12

Graphology / handwriting analysis is a diagnostic tool that makes use of psychology and behavioral sciences for the sake of studying and understanding human behavior. As such, it offers the possibility of identifying personality dynamics and traits, behavioral patterns and tendencies. Talents can be detected and identified and also various psychological and psychiatric disorders and emotional hang-ups.

Handwriting has many diagnostic features, each offering a certain trait or personal characteristic of the writer, all of which are scanned for evaluation in an integrated manner, creating synthesis and finally a full analysis. The slants are one of the more prominent features in the handwriting. They are easy to determine and are very obvious to the onlooker whether the writer himself or the handwriting examiner. Each slant signifies umbrella-like traits and personality dynamics of its own, that typically appears in a repetitive and identifiable manner and offers a wealth of "sub-traits" that often reside together in the same person.

It has to be remembered that people have typical tendencies and emotional structure that they share with other people that belong to the same group they are. The handwriting merely shows those typical tendencies that belong to each group.

However, this short article discusses the initial and prominent issue of parental identification and affiliation existing in the writer's psych and how it influences his or her emotional make up and behavior. it offers a well tried and investigated as well as observed by other theorists but also by the writer of this article, validated over many years and validated through counseling and open discussions with writers of endless sample of handwriting.

Therefore, the writer of this article is certain, that the slants in handwriting provide a reliable precursor in determining who the influential parental figure in the writer's psych or self is.

Arguments can be raised and will be raised, for instance, in regard to new social order in nowadays families, where there are same sex parent or single parenting families and indeed, this topic must be further investigated.

Alfred Adler speaks of several choices made by a child from babyhood, in regard to social and within the family behavior. Let us understand then, that those choices are not conscious or stem from rational understanding. That is the case in the choice of which parental figure is internalized as a role model, or rejected, or cannot be resolved.

We will discuss here as follows the matter of the slants as a reliable source of understanding "who is the parent, the writer identifies with". The following information is useful for graphologists, psychologists and counselors as well as for the general reader. It is also pertinent to personnel screening and career choice, but this shall not be dealt with here. The general population can be divided into 4 groups of writing slants: Right / upright / left. The rest, a small percentage of the writers, write with changing slants, either rapidly changing within a given script (in several typical manners), or changing completely from one document to another. The slant shows who is the parental figure / care taker or role model, the writer identifies with or has been the most influential in his early life. This has shown over many years of experience to be very accurate though there are always subjects who, when questioned, will not answer in the affirmative according to their slant. Still oftentimes, upon deeper investigation and promotion of self awareness, they might agree with the model of the slants as it applies to them in accordance with the following depiction. There will always be writers who may be outside of the scope of these "norms". It also has to be said that parental choice is not done necessarily out of love for the affiliated parent, but is also based on the strength and power and dominance a parent may exercise over the writer as a child and teen and even afterwards.

It has to be well remembered that slant of handwriting is but one of many other features in a given handwriting and those other features ultimately help inform the graphologist of the many hues of the personality in a more cohesive manner in regard to emotional adjustment, adaptively and maturity. The dynamics of Right Slant: Most of those who write with right slant are persons who are basically emotionally responsive rather than rational or have a combination of rational and emotional thinking modes. They are those who identify with their father figure. The father might be a source of identification, pride, love or admiration, or is being feared for his strength, yet valued for his achievements that serve as a role model for the son or daughter. His influence over the child and later on the teen is strong and dictates certain kinds of behavioral and emotional patterns. For girls who have a strong identification with their father, they might be what is called a "daddy's girl"; it is often an empowering identification unless the relationship is of a spoiling nature. Boys who identify with their father or male role model are also empowered by that alliance with the father. That empowerment might be of negative nature just as it might be positive, depending on whom the father is.

"President of the United States of America. James Earl Carter Jr. was born on October 1, 1924 in Plains, Georgia. His father, James Earl Carter Sr., was a hardworking peanut farmer who owned his own small plot of land as well as a warehouse and store. His mother, Bessie Lillian Gordy, was a registered nurse who in the 1920s had crossed racial divides to counsel black women on health care issues. When Jimmy Carter was four years old, the family relocated to Archery, a town approximately two miles from Plains. It was a sparsely populated and deeply rural town, where mule-drawn wagons remained the dominant mode of transportation and electricity and indoor plumbing were still uncommon. Carter was a studious boy who avoided trouble and began working at his father's store at the age of ten. His favorite childhood pastime was sitting with his father in the evenings, listening to baseball games and …."

The dynamics of Left Slant: Most writers who write with left slant are persons who were emotionally responsive, sometimes even highly emotionally responsive, during childhood (as their born natural characteristic) but due to trauma and/or childhood difficulties of all sorts and difficulty to adapt, switched (unconsciously and unwarily) as a new way of adapting to their reality, into a more rational mode of thinking. Therefore, they suppress their emotional issues, distancing themselves from the pain involved, making it easier for them to avoid dealing with it. They say "no" to the father figure for any possible reason such as: A father who might be loving and gentle but is weak in relation to the controlling mother, a too stern or abusive father, a very busy or absent father away from at home etc. Left slant writers identify with the mother figure (out of love and strong connection to her, or of identifying with her strength, a strength which might be masked at times, as in a seemingly weak mother or an ailing one even, who still manages to control the household). Saying nay to the father figure often results in saying nay to authoritative figures in adulthood.

There is a difference in how a male left slant writer regards his mother figure; usually there will be better contact with her and feelings of warmth and attachment or tenderness, later resulting in viewing the wife as a motherly figure as well. On the other hand, for women writers with left slant, the mother is an all dominant figure for better or for worse: strong, even if the strength is hidden, controlling sometimes, not always a source of love but just as often the writer is (or has a sense of) being protected by the mother. Such a left-

slant female writer will emulate her mother often, even when she is not at peace with her. often she is a feminist , or she sees herself as a strong woman and even without awareness, does not let men tell her what to do. Often enough she will prefers to marry a weaker partner and usually becomes the strong partner and leader of the family herself. Both men and women will have trouble accepting authority easily and readily.

The writer is a feminist, very stubborn, she procrastinates, suffers from low self-confidence. She is a writer, very imaginative, quirky, sometimes saying inappropriate things to shock. She attracts men by acting very mysteriously and she never shares how she is really feeling. Her father was an alcoholic and he died some years ago. Her mother is close to her.

Male writer, 50. Dominant mother, father absent a lot during growing up years due to work demands, resented by the writer for various reasons. Inability to identify with the father and find in him a source of nurturing and strength.