Which is better taking notes by handwriting or by typing? Like all research, the answer is in the details and the interpretation, not just the initial results.
The Mueller/Oppenhiemer study The Pen Is Mightier Than the Keyboard Advantages of Longhand Over Laptop Note Taking revealed that since students can type much faster than they can write there is a tendency for students to mindlessly transcribe large volumes of notes. In contrast, with handwritten notes, a student must focus more on the concepts than on the transcription. The authors pointed to additional research in their literature review suggested summarization and conceptualization resulting from handwriting notes added in retention and deeper understanding.
The authors also speculated as did many other bloggers who reposted the summary results that if one could combine the efficiency of typing with the conceptualization of handwriting that taking notes with a laptop or tablet could contribute equally to memory retention. This is a key point of this debate–Rather then just mindlessly type and record the information being transferred if the typist were to apply the same method of summarization and conceptualization that happens with handwriting notes then typing notes would be even more effective and efficient.
While being more efficient with the passive information transfer required from your typical lecture is helpful in dealing with those situations where one has no choice but to take in a lecture, if we are really concerned with deeper learning then we would provide an alternative to the typical lecture. Since the lecture is still the primary mode of information transfer in secondary and post-secondary education this will continue to be an ongoing issue.
While I have no reason to doubt the Mueller/Oppenhiemer study that is currently popular in the traditional media and blogosphere I am always hesitant to trust the “most popular” opinion and I explored further to see if there were any additional studies that provided an alternative perspective. A recent undergraduate research project by Ian Schoen of Pitzer College that directly compared typing notes and handwriting notes in both the lecture and textbook study. In his senior thesis Effects of Method and Context of Note-taking on Memory: Handwriting versus Typing in Lecture and Textbook-Reading Contexts Schoen found that although the survey participants preferred taking notes by hand, his research revealed that typing notes in a lecture produced slightly higher retention scores.
Article Abstract:
Both electronic note-taking (typing) and traditional note-taking (handwriting) are being utilized by college students to retain information. The effects of the method of note-taking and note-taking context were examined to determine if handwriting or typing notes and whether a lecture context or a textbook-reading context influenced retention. Pitzer College and Scripps College students were assigned to either handwrite or type notes on a piece of academic material presented in either a lecture or textbook context and were given a test to assess their retention. The results demonstrated that there was a significant main effect for typing notes such that typing notes produced higher retention scores than handwriting notes. The results also indicated that there was an interaction between the method of note-taking and context such that the lowest scores were achieved in the condition in which participants hand0-wrote notes during a lecture. In total, these findings suggest that typing as a method of note-taking may be an influential factor in memory retention, particularly in a lecture context.
If the goal is to retain information from a lecture or other form of information transfer, then taking notes is better than not taking notes is the one fact consistent in all the research on this topic. It is also clear that much more research will need to be conducted to provide a more definitive answer on this issue. Until all the research is in, one’s personal preference should also play a significant role in deciding just how to take notes.
The other key factor in this debate is that you can’t just blindly trust NPR, Scientific America, popular educational websites or other traditional news sources you have to go back to the primary sources to really see what the research points to and how it has been interpreted. Upon closer reading of the research, one could argue if used properly the typing notes on your laptop could be more effective then handwriting–assuming the note take applies the same summarization and conceptualization skills that are required due to the lesser speed of handwriting.
Reference
Mueller, P. A., & Oppenheimer, D. M. (2014). The Pen Is Mightier Than the Keyboard Advantages of Longhand Over Laptop Note Taking. Psychological Science, 25(6), 1159–1168. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797614524581
Schoen, I. (2012). Effects of method and context of note-taking on memory: Handwriting versus typing in lecture and textbook-reading contexts (Pitzer Senior Theses). Pitzer College. Retrieved from http://scholarship.claremont.edu/pitzer_theses/20/
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