Writing on paper
Here at On The Rocks, we are big fans of writing with pen and Rockbooks. Not much to your surprise, we assume. However, what might surprise you is the amount of research done on the benefits of writing as compared to typing a text on a computer or electronic device. And even more, the findings. The act of writing is a highly complex motorical exercise.
Why creative writing is better with a pen
Laptops are common in lecture halls worldwide. As laptops become smaller and more ubiquitous, and with the advent of tablets, the idea of taking notes by hand just seems old-fashioned to many students today.
Typing your notes is faster — which comes in handy when there's a lot of information to take down. But it turns out there are still advantages to doing things the old-fashioned way.
For one thing, research shows that laptops and tablets have a tendency to be distracting — it's so easy to click over to Facebook in that dull lecture. And a study has shown that the fact that you have to be slower when you take notes by hand is what makes it more useful in the long run. In the study published in Psychological Science, Pam A. Mueller of Princeton University and Daniel M.
Oppenheimer of the University of California, Los Angeles sought to test how note-taking by hand or by computer affects learning. And that extra processing of the material that they were doing benefited them. Mueller and Oppenheimer cited that note-taking can be categorized two ways: generative and nongenerative. Generative note-taking pertains to "summarizing, paraphrasing, concept mapping," while nongenerative note-taking involves copying something verbatim.
And there are two hypotheses to why note-taking is beneficial in the first place. The first idea is called the encoding hypothesis, which says that when a person is taking notes, "the processing that occurs" will improve "learning and retention. Because people can type faster than they write, using a laptop will make people more likely to try to transcribe everything they're hearing.
So on the one hand, Mueller and Oppenheimer were faced with the question of whether the benefits of being able to look at your more complete, transcribed notes on a laptop outweigh the drawbacks of not processing that information.
On the other hand, when writing longhand, you process the information better but have less to look back at. For their first study, they took university students the standard guinea pig of psychology and showed them TED talks about various topics.
Afterward, they found that the students who used laptops typed significantly more words than those who took notes by hand. When testing how well the students remembered information, the researchers found a key point of divergence in the type of question. For questions that asked students to simply remember facts, like dates, both groups did equally well. But for "conceptual-application" questions, such as, "How do Japan and Sweden differ in their approaches to equality within their societies?
The same thing happened in the second study, even when they specifically told students using laptops to try to avoid writing things down verbatim. The more words the students copied verbatim, the worse they performed on recall tests. And to test the external-storage hypothesis, for the third study they gave students the opportunity to review their notes in between the lecture and test. The thinking is, if students have time to study their notes from their laptops, the fact that they typed more extensive notes than their longhand-writing peers could possibly help them perform better.
But the students taking notes by hand still performed better. And I think that will be sort of an easier sell to college students and people of that generation. Accessibility links Skip to main content Keyboard shortcuts for audio player. NPR Shop. Oppenheimer found that students remember more via taking notes longhand rather than on a laptop.
It has to do with what happens when you're forced to slow down. Facebook Twitter Flipboard Email. April 17, AM ET. Heard on Weekend Edition Sunday. NPR Staff. James Doubek. Enlarge this image.
7 BENEFITS OF WRITING ON PAPER. In a world driven by technology and a time when there is an app for nearly everything, why should we still bother to write. If you must write your note on unlined paper, use a sheet of lined paper as a guide to keep your writing straight. Turn Your Handwriting into Digital.
According to several studies, paper lovers seem to simply be making the most effective choice. Smartphones and computers are fantastic tools, but humans have been writing by hand for over years and our brains seem to have adapted to do so. Today, January 23, is National Handwriting Day.
When I said I wrote it, I meant handwrote it, longhand , using inexpensive fountain pens and lined journals.
In Patricia Ann Wade, a learning specialist with Indiana University's School of Medicine, found herself investigating this question, one she had been asked by time-crunched medical students again and again. The answer, she found, was not simple.
7 BENEFITS OF WRITING ON PAPER
In a world driven by technology and a time when there is an app for nearly everything, why should we still bother to write things down on paper? Could there be some real life changing value inherent or is it just an old-fashioned way of doing things? But why do some IT experts who develop the technology we use still keep a notebook? Here are 7 benefits of writing in longhand, or as they say — when the pen is mightier than the keyboard. Whether with our smartphones, tablets or laptops, there is always something calling our attention.
Writing on paper
Though there are clear benefits of typing, there are several reasons to stick to the old pen and paper. Much of the draw towards typing has to do with its speed, accessibility, and capability to be transferred over many mediums instantly. However, when typing for taking notes or studying for a test much of the benefits of scribing are lost. Here are a few of the reasons why note taking should remain on paper. The slower process of writing by hand allows your brain to think and concentrate on what it is you are writing about. This allows the brain to draw deeper connections and allows the information to be more easily remembered. Several studies have shown that students who handwrite their notes have a deeper understanding of the material, and on average achieve higher test scores. Writing longhand also allows the brain to make better connections as it is less distracted by its surroundings. This translates to better problem-solving abilities and better reading comprehension.
Writing on paper.
I n a wonderful article published on the New York Review of Books blog the poet Charles Simic proclaimed "writing with a pen or pencil on a piece of paper is becoming an infrequent activity". Simic was praising the use of notebooks of course, and, stationery fetishism aside , it got me thinking about authors who write their novels and poems longhand into notebooks rather than directly onto the screen.
The Benefits Of Writing With Good Old Fashioned Pen And Paper
Prolific writers such as James Patterson and Stephen King and many others prefer pen and paper to typewriters and computers when they create their stories. Patterson even uses pencils. While working his way through college, Patterson felt the urge to write. And J. A study found that putting ink to paper stimulates a part of the brain called the Reticular Activating System, or the RAS and that this area of the brain, which is associated with learning, "lit up" much more when subjects were asked to write words like "spaceship" by hand versus just studying the word closely. Another study from the University of Washington, found that elementary school students who wrote essays with a pen rather than a computer keyboard not only wrote more than their keyboarded peers, but they also wrote faster and in more complete sentences. There are even a few physicians who believe the act of writing on paper exercises key motor-skills, memory, and other cognitive muscles that help keep you sharp as you age. But for many writers, longhand just feels better. The physicality of longhand pleases me. I can revise as I work in a way that doesn't happen on a laptop. There's a greater sense of space when using a pen. A lined notebook is less judgmental. But most importantly, I write in a more economical way. I think harder about one good sentence following another, which for me is all that matters.
Attention, Students: Put Your Laptops Away
Laptops are common in lecture halls worldwide. As laptops become smaller and more ubiquitous, and with the advent of tablets, the idea of taking notes by hand just seems old-fashioned to many students today. Typing your notes is faster — which comes in handy when there's a lot of information to take down. But it turns out there are still advantages to doing things the old-fashioned way. For one thing, research shows that laptops and tablets have a tendency to be distracting — it's so easy to click over to Facebook in that dull lecture. And a study has shown that the fact that you have to be slower when you take notes by hand is what makes it more useful in the long run. In the study published in Psychological Science, Pam A. Mueller of Princeton University and Daniel M.
