Crowdscience

CrowdScience listener Azeddine from Algeria has had bad handwriting since he was a child. In fact, it was so untidy that, when he later became a chemistry lecturer, his university students complained that they couldn’t read his lecture notes. That was when he decided he had to do something about it. And it got him wondering… why do some of us have very neat handwriting while other people’s is almost unreadable? Why do his sisters all write beautifully when his natural style is quite the opposite? Presenter Alex Lathbridge – who admits that his handwriting isn’t always the tidiest – sets out to answer Azeddine’s question. He explores the different factors which determine how well we write. How much of it is inherited? What part does family and education play? And what’s actually going on in our brains when we apply pen to paper? Alex talks to anthropologist Monika Saini in Delhi who has analysed writing styles within families and in different regions across India. She tells him about the genetic and