Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Psychogram

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was No consensus. Randykitty (talk) 12:28, 1 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Psychogram[edit]

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Non-notable fringe theory. Note that the "sources" are self-published and even the anecdotal "evidence" is unsourced. Orange Mike | Talk 14:54, 14 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Delete: Unsourced and unsourceable fringe blither and OR. Flush twice. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 15:48, 14 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Language-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 21:57, 14 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Behavioural science-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 21:57, 14 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Delete as per above. Search of major US news revealed only a few scattered hits, nothing consistent; nothing much in international news, nor in psychology-related sources, there was a mention here but without much context. Merriam-Webster does have a listing for the term which it defines as a description of the mental functioning of an individual; especially : the pattern of responses to a projective technique (as the Rorschach test); my guess is it used to be a term occasionally used in conjunction with lie detectors and Rorschach tests, but I see no indications that it is used much currently. Possible fictional use here as a Ghostbusters-type helmet. Given the lack of consistency, not much signs of use, and piddling pageview stats around 10/day I think we can pull the lever twice as per Dominus Vobisdu.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 22:36, 19 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Keep : The Psychogram is a well organized and objective method of handwriting analysis. Wellingham-Jones, P. (1989). Evaluation of the handwriting of successful women through the Roman-Staempfli Psychogram. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 69, 999-1010 is a supporting study that used the Psychogram. Let me see if I can find more.

Investimate (talk) 15:45, 20 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, DGG ( talk ) 01:12, 23 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Delete, or rather, stub and move to Wiktionary. What a lot of non-notable waffle, quite free of reliable sources. I've stubbed it into a concise definition, per the invitation in the template ("Feel free to edit the article"). You're welcome. Obviously it'll now need to be moved to Wiktionary, but that should wait till this discussion is closed. Not sure if Collins and Merriam-Webster can serve as references, once it's moved? The previous references, four books, seem awfully in-universe. They're not reliable third-party sources at all. Bishonen | talk 23:16, 26 October 2014 (UTC).[reply]

Move to Wiktionary I agree, a definition is all this should be.--Auric talk 01:05, 27 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Auric, why then did you add a stub template that encourages the reader to help Wikipedia by expanding it? :-( That doesn't make sense to me. I've removed the template. Bishonen | talk 01:18, 27 October 2014 (UTC).[reply]

Sorry about that. I saw the suggestion after I applied the stub template. Then my computer froze, so I couldn't remove it.--Auric talk 12:26, 27 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

No problem. But I sometimes wish we had an anti-stub template: "This is a very short article that says it all. You can help Wikipedia by not bloating it up." Bishonen | talk 14:45, 27 October 2014 (UTC).[reply]

Weak keep Changing from delete to weak keep after article being pared down and hunting a little further. If kept, I'll try to improve it, but my sense is there is not one specific meaning of psychogram but that the term has been used in different senses, and there is no clear definition at present. First sense is composite psychological measurement, a diagram, usually in the form of a circle, mentioned in a source from 1950 and 1959 and perhaps developed by a few psychologists such as Dan Anthony in 1960s with sources such as this one and non-RS sources such as this one with a book by Anthony here, but which never caught on within the mainstream psychological academic establishment, possibly because there was no consistent sense of what psychograms were or how they should be used. A second sense is a term in handwriting analysis (possibly related to the first sense). A third sense is related to the first, but with less emphasis on measuring personality and more on measuring psychological perception, with the term being used in conjunction with the Rorschach projection technique, such as here and here and here. There are other senses too, like it appears as a book title in a fiction book as well as the title of a non-fiction self-help book in 1975 (which doesn't appear to have caught on sales-wise). Illinois State University named its newsletter Psychogram. It was used by a poet to describe a type of poetry. The term appears briefly in 1896 in connection with early vision experiments. Still, all that said, I do not think there is a strong case for choosing keep, only a weak case.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 13:22, 27 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Nice research, Tomwsulcer. I know it's a real word and a real concept; or rather, as you show, the word refers to several not very closely related concepts. Don't you think it would therefore need several articles, if kept in Wikipedia at all? We don't have articles of the format "X means either a, b, or c." That's actually the format of disambiguation pages. So, wouldn't your information above fit best in Wiktionary, unless you can find so much material in reliable sources that, say, three separate Wikipedia articles would each have some substance? (But then perhaps you can.) Bishonen | talk 14:45, 27 October 2014 (UTC).[reply]

Hmmm, good question, Bishonen, I am not really sure overall about what is best. I think an article of the format ""X means either a, b, or c" is possible since the meanings are somewhat related (in the field of psychology, which sometimes encompasses perception as well as handwriting analysis). My sense is the meanings are not clearly distinct enough for psychogram to be a disambiguation page, or whether they belong in Wiktionary either. My sense is Wikipedia does have many articles which have somewhat ambiguous terms; I've worked on several such as Cover your ass and Character actor which have multiple senses, and the Wikipedia entry reflects that, so I think it is handle-able. But overall I am not sure what direction is best here.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 14:57, 27 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I also have to say congratulations on the research! You found some RS which support the validity of graphology which I was not aware of (I am a handwriting analyst - the "scientific" one). And yes, what you have described as the first sense is the same as the second sense. It is a system of handwriting analysis first developed by Hungarian psychologist and graphologist Klara Roman and Georg Staepfli for the Hungarian governent and further developed by Dan Anthony, a psychologist and graphologist who taught graphology in the New School for Social Research, New York. Various graphic variables (organization, simplification, rhythm, speed, trend, trizonal dynamics etc.) are evaluated and then plotted on the diagram. It helps a handwriting analyst to be objective while studying handwriting. Investimate (talk) 12:40, 28 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.