The experiment was in two phases; the first tested participants (referred to as the ‘‘handwriters’’)
who produced a sample of handwriting and filled in a questionnaire. The second group
(the ‘‘raters’’) sat at a computer rating the handwriting for gender. The majority of the handwriters
were recruited from the School of Psychologys undergraduate experimental requirement
programme (EPR) as part of their first year of study. There were 120 participants, half of
whom were female. When the data were analysed gender was coded as a dummy variable with
males represented by ‘‘1’’ and females by ‘‘2’’. The handwriters had a mean age of 21.81 years
(SD 6.81 years) and ranged in age from 18 to 55 years. There was a minority of left handers (6
male, 7 female) and one male ambidextrous writer. The raters were similarly recruited from the
EPR, but these were second year students in order to minimise the possibility of them being
familiar with any of the handwriting. There were 20 who volunteered (18 female, 2 male)
and these had a mean age was 21.00 years (SD 2.07 years). They ranged in age from 19 to
27 years old.