Why writing by hand beats typing for enhancing memory, learning

A new study examined the brain activity in students as they took notes and found that writing by hand stimulated more electrical activity in the brain. Estimated read time: 4-5 minutes SALT LAKE CITY — At a time when schools are abandoning teaching cursive, and texting and typing overtake penning notes by significant margins, science suggests that writing things down by hand sets them in memory better, enhancing learning. And especially for young kids, using fine motor skills to form letters helps learning, spelling accuracy and memory recall. A new study in Frontiers in Psychology reinforces what other studies have found: Using pen and paper or, as Scientific American puts it, “even a stylus and tablet, is still the best way to learn.” In the study, researchers from Norway examined the brain activity in students as they took notes and found that writing by hand stimulated more electrical activity in the brain across regions that control movement, vision, sensory processing and memory. “The ongoing substitution of handwriting by typewriting in almost every educational setting may seem somewhat misguided as it could affect the learning process in a negative way,” per the study. “We show that when writing by hand, brain connectivity patterns are far more elaborate than when typewriting on a keyboard,” said professor Audrey van der Meer, a brain researcher at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology and co-author of the study, in a news release. “Such widespread brain connectivity is known to be crucial for memory formation and for encoding new information and, therefore, is beneficial for learning.” It’s the writing by hand, rather than whether it’s actually cursive, that’s believed to be beneficial, the researchers reported. Printing the letters also stimulates the brain, according to van der Meer and her colleague, F.R. van der Weel, also a psychology researcher at the university. Study mechanics Thirty-six university students were given electroencephalograms as they were “repeatedly prompted to either write or type a word that appeared on the screen.” By hand, they wrote in cursive using a digital pen on a touchscreen. Typing involved using a single […]

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