HANDWRITING EXAMINATION

Module No. 3
Total Study Hours: 6hrs
Module Writer: PROF. RIZALINO D. FLORES III
Registered Criminologist
Master of Arts in Criminology

Module and Learning Facilitator Contacts: FB Messanger: Rizalino Flores

rizalinoflores3@gmail.com

Module Learning Outcomes:

• Recognize different kinds of handwriting

• Expound the physiological basis of handwriting identification
• Specify the process of handwriting examination
• Explain the acquisition and variations of handwriting characteristics
• Recognize appropriate and sufficient standards for comparison
• Discuss how proof of authenticity is established in handwriting
• Demonstrate ability to facilitate requested standards

CONTENT

I. Writing and Handwriting

a. Handwriting - A visible effect of bodily movement which is an almost unconscious

expression of fixed muscular habits, reacting from fixed mental impressions of certain
ideas associated with script form
b. Writing - is the visible result of a very complicated series of acts, being as a whole or a
combination of certain forms which are the very visible result of mental and muscular
habits acquired by long continued painstaking effort.

II. Kinds of Handwriting

a. Cursive- writing in which the letters are for the most part joined together (dactus link)
b. Hand Lettering – any disconnected block capitals sometimes referred to as manuscripts
writing or letter printing
c. Disguise Writing – it is a writing of a person who deliberately try to alter his usual
writing habits in the hope of hiding his identity
d. Natural Writing – any specimen of writing executed without any attempt to control or
alter its identifying habits and its usual quality of execution

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III. Physiological Basis of Handwriting

a. The impulses to form a letter begins in the brain’s writing center in the CORTEX
b. This center near the motor area of the cortex is responsible for the final movement
involved in handwriting. The importance of this center is that when it becomes disease
as in AGRAPHIA, one loses the ability to write although he could still grasped writing
instrument

c. In writing, the pen functions as an extension of the hand. The fingers transmit to the
pen the directive impulses and the variations in muscular tension that according to the
nature of the writer’s nervous organization, occur during the act of writing. Hence, as
each writer has his own way of holding his hand, manipulating the pen, and exerting
pressure, the same pen in different hands will produce entirely different strokes

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 d. The hand contains two kinds of muscles which function in the act of writing. A group of
EXTENSOR muscles push up the pen to form the UPWARD STROKES, and ease the
tension produced as a result of flexion by a group of muscles called the FLEXOR muscles
which push the pen to form the DOWNWARD STROKE. These flexor and extensor
muscles combine with lumbrical muscles to form LATERAL STROKE

e. The delicate way in which the various muscles used in writing work together to produce
written forms is known as MOTOR COORDINATION.

IV. Steps in the development of Mature Writing

a. First, when a person first begins to learn the art of handwriting, penmanship copybook
forms, blackboard illustrations of the different letters are placed before him. His first
step is one of imitation only by a process of drawing, painstaking, laborious slow copying
of the letter forms. The form of each letter at first occupies the focus of his attention.

Note: Copy Book Form – The design or illustrations of letters which are fundamental to a writing system

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 b. Second, as the person progress, the matter of form recedes, and the focus of attention
is centered on the execution of various letters, that is they are actually written instead
of drawn. (mastery of pattern execution)

c. Third, the manual operation in the execution of letters after more progress, is likewise is
soon relegated to the subjective mind and the process of writing becomes more or less
automatic. As the person attains maturity in writing by many repetitions, writing
becomes an unconscious coordinated movement that produces a record. Attention is no
longer given to the process of writing itself because the subject matter to be written
now occupies the focus of attention.

V. Factors of Modifying a Mature Writing

a. Education
b. Training
c. Personal taste
d. Artistic Ability
e. Masculature and nerve tone; and the like

VI. Manner of Modifying Mature Writing from Copy Book Form

a. Simplification - discarding of unessential details and go as far as to strip the letter to the
skeleton making it either clear-cut and precise, or bare and careless.

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 b. Elaboration – decorative strokes are added to the plain letter forms, giving writing rick
and ample, or to ornate character.

c. Linear pattern – writing shows no concern for form so that lines and angles
predominate, and loops and angles are not pronounced.

VII. Scientific Method of Handwriting Examination

a. Recognition (Analysis) of characteristics-properties or characteristics are observed or

measured, determined
b. Complete Comparison of Characteristics-properties or characteristics of the unknown
are determined thru analysis are now compared with the familiar or recorded
properties of known items (standards)
c. Correct interpretation (EVALUATION) of characteristics- similarities or dissimilarities in
properties or characteristics will each have a certain value for identification, determined
by its likelihood or occurrence. The weight or significance of each must therefore be
considered.

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VIII. Standards

a. In questioned documents examination, it refers to those things whose origins are known
and can be proven and which can be legally used as samples to compare with other
matters in question.

b. Types of Standards

i. Procured or Collected Standards - Those which can be obtained from files of

documents executed in the course of a person’s day-to-day business, official,
social or personal activities. They often serve as the best or most appropriate
standards in the determination of the genuineness of a questioned signature or
writing (readily available writings).

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 ii. Request Standards - Those which are given or made at the request of an
investigator for purposes of making a comparative examination with the
questioned writing. They serve in addition to collected standards which could be
possibly obtained, as appropriate standards in determining the identity or
authorship of anonymous letter.

c. Points to be Considered in Gathering Procured or Collected Standards

i.
Amount of Standard writing available
ii.
Similarity of subject matter
iii.
Relative dates of the standards with the questioned signature or writing
iv.Conditions under which both questioned and known writings or signatures are
prepared
v. Kind of instrument and paper used

d. Points to be considered in Obtaining Requested Standards

i.The material should be dictated to the writer

ii.Dictated text must be carefully selected
iii.An adequate amount of writing must be included
iv. Some portions of the dictation must be repeated at least three times
v. Writing instruments and paper should be similar to those used in questioned
document
vi. Dictation should be interrupted at an interval
vii. Normal writing conditions should be arrange

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Assessment Methods

1. Analytical Exam
2. Experiential Learning:

a. Handwriting modification
b. Recognition of handwriting characteristics

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