Abstract
BackgroundThe size of a person's signature may reveal implicit information about how the self is perceived although this has not been closely examined.Methods/ResultsWe conducted three experiments to test whether increases in signature size can be induced. Specifically, the aim of these experiments was to test whether changes in signature size reflect a person's current implicit sense of embodiment. Experiment 1 showed that an implicit affect task (positive subliminal evaluative conditioning) led to increases in signature size relative to an affectively neutral task, showing that implicit affective cues alter signature size. Experiments 2 and 3 demonstrated increases in signature size following experiential self-focus on sensory and affective stimuli relative to both conceptual self-focus and external (non-self-focus) in both healthy participants and patients with anorexia nervosa, a disorder associated with self-evaluation and a sense of disembodiment. In all three experiments, increases in signature size were unrelated to changes in self-reported mood and larger than manipulation unrelated variations.ConclusionsTogether, these findings suggest that a person's sense of embodiment is reflected in their signature size.
Highlights
Variations in the size of a person’s signature have long been of interest to graphologists and personality researchers who regard signatures as expressive movements that reveal implicit information about how individuals perceive the self [1]
Zweigenhaft [2] noticed that U.S professors had larger signatures than students, observations that were subsequently replicated in U.S [3] and Irani samples [4] where differences in signature size were apparent even when groups were matched on the size and number of letters that the signatures contained
The average increase in signature size was 13.1% in the experimental condition whereas there was a 1.79% decrease in the control condition. This finding was not moderated by gender
Summary
Variations in the size of a person’s signature have long been of interest to graphologists and personality researchers who regard signatures as expressive movements that reveal implicit information about how individuals perceive the self [1]. This work suggests that differences in signature size reflect variations in perceived social status or self-esteem. Zweigenhaft [2] noticed that U.S professors had larger signatures than students, observations that were subsequently replicated in U.S [3] and Irani samples [4] where differences in signature size were apparent even when groups were matched on the size and number of letters that the signatures contained. Zweigenhaft and Marlowe [5] showed that differences in signature size could be induced by experimental manipulations of self-esteem. The size of a person’s signature may reveal implicit information about how the self is perceived this has not been closely examined
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