Is there a bias against mentioning your name on presentation slides?
There is nothing wrong with mentioning your own name in full in citations on your own slides, and nobody would think anything of it if you did. However, there are a number of reasons why people do this.
- Replacing your own name with initials is a subtle way of emphasizing that it is your work that is being cited. You can think of it as a “humblebrag”.
- Since you are usually talking about your own work, you end up citing yourself a lot. Replacing your name with initials simply saves space, especially if you have a long name.
In my experience in pure mathematics, it seems to be somewhat of a norm not to write your full name when citing yourself and just use initials. I have seen this on many conference presentations or any other talks using slides.
When giving a blackboard talk it has the advantage of using less space on the board which typically is a scarce resource.
On the other hand, I have also seen the occasional talk where this "rule" was not followed and I do not think that this left a bad impression on anyone.
To the question, briefly: Abbreviating as described is common in math, but I can't imagine anyone reacting negatively or at all to variations in something so minute.
An alternative motive from a mathematician's perspective I don't see in the other answers or comments:
My surname is fairly common. So I use just an initial in my slides when referencing theorems I've worked on as a concise clarification that I am the person referred to. I'm not aware of anyone else sharing my surname in my field of specialization, but that's hardly a guarantee. This has nothing to do with encouraging memorizing my name, as that's in a header/footer on virtually every slide.