Joe arrived at his scheduled time. As the session started he was anxious to tell me something. “Bob,” he said, “Guess what I did yesterday evening?” Puzzled, I made a couple of wild guesses, “You went to a new restaurant.” With a big grin, he said, “none of the above.” The fact is that last night I put the final touches on my life tattoo!” He raised his t-shirt and across his abdomen, running up to and along his chest, was a giant tattoo (although similar to the story, this tattoo below is simply illustrative. I found this on the web in the public domain, it is not connected to the story).
At first glance, it looked like two faces staring at a something like a vista or mountain. It was hard to make sense of it. But then, Joe launched into a description of what it meant, which was basically a diagram of his life. Its ups and downs, different relationships, and time advancing. Details of his life, Joe had depicted in forms and images. They were connected or disconnected depending on how much he valued specific experiences, people he’d met or places he’d lived. A loosely structured sequence of whether, in his view, it was a wrong turn or a right turn. Joe is a mature adult male. He has lived a long and complex life and this tattoo, I presume, was one way he kept track of it. I couldn’t help think of Ray Bradbury’s story, “The Illustrated Man.”
I could certainly appreciate why Joe’s tattoo was complicated and a difficult interpretation for the uninitiated observer.
The breadth of the tattoo, the meaning he assigned to it, and the experiences associated with its ongoing creation got me thinking about the concept of tattoo and tattooing. I don’t personally have a tattoo. I’ve really never considered getting one. It seems like a painful ordeal that would not bring me much meaning or satisfaction. But, my own thinking does not reflect the view of other people who hold deep positive beliefs and desires for a tattoo.
Why do people tattoo? What are the benefits? Is tattooing an idiosyncratic act, or does it reflect larger social trends?
THE HISTORY OF TATTOO
Placing decorative illustrations onto or into one’s skin has been in practice since the earliest social organizations existed. The Egyptians used tattoos as early as 4000 b.c., sometimes in reverence to various Gods, to pay homage to the unknown and the unseen. Mummies have been recovered from Mesopotamia that date to as early as the XI Dynasty (2160-1994 BC) showing tattoo art forms inscribed on bodies.
One famous tattoo is that of Amunet, a priestess of the goddess Hathor. This ancient tattoo who was found at Thebes and was revered by most Egyptians at that time.
The female mummy above displays several lines and dots tattooed about her body. The meaning of these is not entirely clear, perhaps only body decorations, but the tattoo process is undeniable.
The Japanese began tattooing for both cosmetic and religious purposes around 500 BC. The Japanese method of tattooing involves puncturing the skin with fine metal needles to create multicolor designs. Indigenous Eskimo tribes developed their own tattooing techniques using bone needles where they pulled soot-covered thread through the skin. The story continues from there.
WHO GETS TATTOOED
In a 2004 survey of 500 population-representative United States respondents, age 18-50 years, 24% (n = 120) reported having a tattoo with an additional 21% reporting that they had considered obtaining one. In this sample, 65% of tattooed respondents reported obtaining their first tattoo by age 24, with women more likely than men to be > 30 years old at first tattoo. Tattooed respondents mostly had them done by local tattoo artists (98%), usually in professional tattoo parlors (80%).
Another cross-section of individuals in the United States were queried about tattoos as part of the Tattoos, Guns & Love in the U.S. 2019 Statista Survey. This study consisted of 450 respondents queried between Dec 3 and 10, 2019
36% age 18-29 had at least one tattoo.
In 2012, 45 million people (21%) in America report one or more tattoos.
35% of United Kingdom citizens aged 30-39 report tattoos.
30% of US college graduates report tattoos.
11% of people with tattoos in the United States are 50-64 years old.
36% of the US Armed Forces, including military veterans, have tattoos.
CHARACTERISTICS OF TATTOOED PERSONS
Are the tattooed different from the non-tattooed?”
B. J. Ruffle, J of Economic Behavior and Organization, 166 (2019) pp. 566-585 used Amazon’s Mechanical Turk platform to recruit 1,104 persons. These people anonymously indicated how often they engaged in various short-sighted financial, health and social decisions, such as overeating and posting personal information online. Furthermore, they also answered four cognitive reflection questions, which tended to generate intuitive but incorrect responses. The correct answers require more analysis of the question. Results indicated that people with tattoos and people who reported they planned to get a tattoo scored higher on measures of short-sightedness and impulsivity. Whether this finding is generalizable is not known, but it does raise an interesting question around factors that motivate people to tattoo themselves.
REASONS FOR TATTOOS
For what reasons do people get tattoos?
This question was investigated in a recent study led by psychologist Luzelle Naudé of the University of the Free State in South Africa. (see Current Psychology, 25, April 2017) Who queried a small sample of 175 college students about Tattoo behavior.
Most of these student (78%) did not have tattoos, and most of their parents (92%) did not have tattoos. However, most of the participants’ friends (74%) had tattoos — and almost half the students queried (47%) were considering getting a tattoo or another tattoo.
For those who got a tattoo (25%) it was for personal meaning (such as to mark a significant experience or struggle). Participants reported placing a tattoo: “to keep my mother’s memory,” “a way of honoring my first child,” and “presented what I was going through at a certain time of my life.”
To the question: “What do you think are people’s opinions of tattoos?”, most (39%) felt that people had negative feelings, by contrast 17% of the participants reported that people felt positively about tattoos.
Is there a Tattoo Personality?
There could be many reasons that a person decides to get tattooed. A tattoo might symbolize, for example, a new-found love, or a tattoo might mark a particular experience, or the completion of a life milestone (as in Joe’s case). Someone might tattoo as a sign of distinction or to symbolize being part of a certain group or clan. For example, a gang tattoo. A tattoo might identify a belief, “In God I Trust,” or codify a special relationship, “Mother,” or telegraph a belief-driven behavior “I’m Not Vaccinated.”
There is conjecture around a personality type that seeks tattooing. In a 2012 study (Swami et al. Psychol Rep, 111, 97-106) a sample of 530 young German adults, found an association between tattooing and widely known personality characteristics, Neuroticism, from the NEO-PI (Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness to Experience Personality Inventory). Compared to the non-tattooed (N=420), tattooed respondents (n=120) had higher scores on Extraversion, Experience Seeking, and the Need for Uniqueness than the non-tattooed.
Other studies have grouped tattoos with body piercing. These studies have concluded that those who modify their body have a greater tendency towards sensation seeking and unconventional attitudes towards sexuality, and impulsivity. One stable finding is that people who tattoo tend to aspire for uniqueness, or to stand out in some way. In fact, one group of researchers has developed a “Theory of Uniqueness” to frame tattooing as “a willingness to violate social conventions and a tendency to behave in a nonconformist manner.”
SUMMARY
Tattoos are a clear and present phenomenon in our social world. People continue, in large numbers, to adorn their bodies with permanent ink. Ink adornments will always be a medium for social messaging or signaling, and today is no different than in the past. Certainly, tattooing has had its utilitarian function (for better or worse). Think about prisoners of war tattooes. But, most tattooing is personal preference, an individual choice. Coercion could be involved (gang tattooes), but this is limited to certain groups and cultures.
Tattooing deserves to be understood from a broad perspective and it would be short-sighted to label or judge a person based on a tattoo, whether it be recently, or done when a person was young.
What are your ideas about tattoo behavior?