Surprise, e-signatures are one of the fastest growing global practices, basically because of their convenience.
What we don’t really know is whether people perceive e-signatures to be equivalent symbol of a traditional hand written signature.
Unless you take the results of four studies of e-signatures into account. Which demonstrate that although functionally the same, e-signatures evoked markedly different psychological reactions than hand written signatures.
The studies showed that e-signatures “evoked a weaker sense of the signer’s presence and involvement”. This weaker sense of social presence, in turn, induced negativity: People were more likely to discount the validity of an e-signed application than that of an identical application signed by hand. Or in plain words, people treat a signature with a higher regard than an e-signature.
So, e-signed contracts could lead to a greater likelihood of contract breaches. Negativity toward e-signatures persisted across five different types of e-signatures, regardless of an individual’s level of comfort with technology.
Taken together, the studies revealed a deeply rooted psychological reactions to a practice that is now prevalent worldwide.