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“Long Hand Writing Versus the Word Processor”

Most people were taught how to write using a simple process… with pen and paper, but

today, most people skip the pen and paper and go straight to the word processor. Typing pro-

grams have become so important to college students and their writing, because assignments are

required to be typed before submission. With technology growing rapidly in the twenty first cen-

tury, are word processors affecting students’ quality of writing?

Previous studies have shown how students prefer the computer and word processors to

write papers, because the computer can attract students’ attention better than the teacher can any-

more (Setzer and Monke). The National Council of English Teachers studied how/if word pro-

cessors affect scholarly writing and what college professors think of the subject. The study found

that most professors felt they wrote better on word processors, but their results may not have re-

flected that. Even though this research covers the cognitive thought and reasoning on why writ-

ing by longhand helps with the cognitive thought process in writing, what the research does not

cover is how and when to write in longhand and when using the Word Processor should be incor-

porated eventually into writing. With technology and computers being such a vital skill to master

today, students must learn how to incorporate traditional writing by longhand and the new elec-

tric literacy our world is evolving into.

The following research will focus on why writing rough drafts by longhand results in a

better paper overall rather than typing a rough draft on the computer. My paper will also discuss

if word processors are more popular among college students, and if so, why.

Methodology:

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With my research, I wanted to understand why writing rough drafts by longhand pro-

duces better content in papers than when typing rough drafts. I also wanted to examine the bad

habits that result from using software like the Word Processor. I was able to find my answers

through scholarly research and a survey.

Before I collected my own data, I read previous studies and experiments performed by

teachers, authors, and psychologists to help me decide what data I should collect. I started to ob-

serve students in my classes and noticed that a majority of students typed their notes on their

computers, and most students wrote essays and papers on there, too.

My research and observations made me want to get the opinions of college students on

the matter. The best way to get their opinions was through a survey. I created a survey on a web-

site called SurveyMonkey. The survey consisted of four questions. I reached over six hundred

college students from universities across the nation. My target audience was college students, be-

cause writing is a crucial skill to master during a college career. I was able to reach college stu-

dents thru the internet via Facebook. I sent the survey over the internet, because I felt the internet

was the fastest way to reach a variety of students across the nation. Seventy out of the six hun-

dred college students voluntarily took the survey. The four questions they answered were:

1. Do you perform any pre-writing (such as webs, outlines etc) before you write

an essay/paper? If so, please explain your writing process.

2. When writing, do you start writing with a pen/pencil and paper or typing in a word

processor?

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3. Do you think you earn a better, final grade when you start the rough draft by hand

writing it or typing it? (This is not referring to the FINAL PAPER you turn in, just the

initial rough draft process before submission).

4. Describe your ENTIRE planning process for writing a paper.

After the survey was posted for a day and a half, I looked at the results and analyzed

them by making charts and graphs to separate the information. After I analyzed my data, I real-

ized there were more questions I wanted to ask. I should have asked students to explain their rea-

soning behind their question number three (do you earn a better grade starting your writing in

longhand or typing it). I also wanted to ask other questions about their grade average, what

grades they usually make in English, and what their favorite subject in school is (whether it was

language arts based or not) and their age (for demographic purposes).

Once I collected all the research and the data I needed, I had to weed through the infor-

mation and put the puzzle pieces together. I related my survey results to the scholarly articles I

read to find any connections or contradictions. I grouped my information into different categories

and used this information as my support for my argument. My categories were: intimacy with

long hand writing, the convenience of the Word Processor, and the bad habits Word Processor

creates. These categories helped me organize my information and focus my research.

Results:

After all the data was collected from the survey, I was curious to see the results. My sur-

vey returned with 70 participants in a day and a half, and I found that a majority of students still

plan before writing. Planning strategies varied from a simple outline to more complex strategies

such as a web, outline, and brainstorming, followed by meetings with their teacher. There is no

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right or wrong way to plan. Christina Haas used Hayes Roth’s definition of planning which is

“the predetermination of a course of action aimed at achieving a goal” (qtd. in Hayes Roth 1979).

Even some students claimed to jot down ideas on the Word Processor, which is considered a type

of planning, because it helped them to achieve their writing goal. My next question asked how

many students start their rough drafts by hand or by typing it. The results indicated that 24.3% of

students started by hand and 74.3% started on the Word Processor. The other 1.4% said they had

other methods of starting their papers. The survey concluded that word processors are more pop-

ular than handwriting. My next question was about students’ opinions on whether their final

grade would be better if they handwrote their rough draft or typed it on a word processor, and

the results indicated that 30% of students said by hand, 50% claimed by Word Processor, and the

other 20% believed it did not matter which way they wrote their paper. The final question asked

students to describe their entire writing processes. Since the survey question was in essay form,

results varied, and answers ranged from “one draft” to an entire paragraph about how having a

plan is “more ideal”.

I collected information on the intimacy of longhand writing and bad habits of the Word

Processor. Some articles believed that the Word Processor can benefit writing, but only for the

convenience the computer program creates. I also read previous experiments done by psycholo-

gists, teachers, and professional writers. I even examined the opposite side of my argument for

insight. Most arguments that supported the use of the Word Processor were highly opinionated

and lacked credibility.

Christina Haas, an English Professor at the Carnegie-Mellon University, studied the ef-

fects of the Word Processor and planning. Haas had ten expert writers and ten college freshman

write essays in three different forms: with pen and paper, on a Word Processor, and a combina-

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tion of both. Haas examined the essays and looked for initial planning, conceptual planning

(content and ideas), and sequential planning (word meanings).

Results conclude in the tables below.

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Tables of Christina Haas from experiment in “How the Writing Medium Shapes the Writing Process: Effects of the Word Processing on Planning”

Results from the experiment showed that there was less planning with word processing. Also, the

conceptual planning was higher for student writers with pen and paper than when participants

used Word Processor. The only time Word Processor had a higher percentage was for sequential

planning (“how” to say what the writer “means”). Since typing on a Word Processor is faster for

skilled programmers, this conclusion is accurate and shows one way the Word Processor is more

convenient than writing by longhand. A person can usually type a sentence faster than if they

hand wrote it out, thus, sequential planning is higher in word processors than writing in long-

hand. The results show that students produce better ideas in their paper when writing by hand,

because the conceptual results were higher with the handwritten results.

With my survey, there is an application that allows me to see what each individual an-

swered for all three questions. More than 70% of the students that said they wrote their rough

drafts on the word processor and believed their final paper was better when they started on a

word processor claimed they did not plan before writing and did not have a strategic writing

process. Haas experiment indicated that planning is important to the writing processes, and stu-

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dents that use the word processor do not plan as much as students that handwrite their rough

drafts.

Understanding that handwritten papers develop more conceptual planning, writers can be

more interactive with their writing. Peter Lyman, a sociologist, explains the differences between

a typist and hand writers. “Typists let the computer allow them to release a “spo-

ken voice” because the screen had text that was processual and in temporal

form which replaced inflexible typed gage,” (Lyman 22). Humanists say that

computers help with productivity and efficiency in professions, but do not

help creative thought and writing (Lyman).

Another interesting idea is that longhand writing produces better ideas, because a writer

is more intimate with their work. As Humanists believe the computer takes away from creative

writing, the intellectual aspect of when a writer holds and touches their work can influence the

creative side of writing. According to psychologist, David Chandler, the body and mind are con-

nected spiritually, and the hands help express feelings not just verbally but also physically with

gesture expressions. As authors Ronald T. Kellog and Suzanne Mueller, “Computers do not sim-

ply amplify our mental functioning. Rather, there are qualitative changes in mental functioning

taking place when computers restructure tasks in the key to understanding the effects of cogni-

tive tools” (qtd. in Pea 1985). When a person types on the computer, there is no connection be-

tween the hands and the mind. A person cannot touch their text on the computer with the same

affect a person can when they physically hold their handwritten rough draft. The hand also con-

centrates a person and is connected to the kinesthetic memory (Chandler 67). According to J. G.

Quinn and G. E. Ralston, psychologists at the University of St. Andrews, kinesthetic memory is

defined as “Arm movements rather than the more commonly employed eye movements are used

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to provide initial information about the sorts of movements relevant to the code and to allow an

empirical separation of the contributions of movement and attention”.

The survey indicated that the Word Processor is popular among college students today,

but that does not mean the Word Processor creates better ideas than writing by hand. In fact, my

survey did not support nor disprove my research. The survey was directed more towards the

planning process of college students (whether they still made outlines and rough drafts by hand)

and what their personal opinion was on the argument.

Bangert-Drowns researched over 20 studies relating to my research. The results of each

experiment were different and contained different messages. Bangert-Drowns makes a clear

point that most studies vary in results, because they each focus on a different issue of word pro-

cessors versus longhand. More research should be conducted to focus mainly on how to incorpo-

rate both writing processes, because recently, using the Word Processor is inevitable and is faster

to use.

Since the Word Processor is unavoidable for college assignments, students should under-

stand how to incorporate the program into their own writing and when not to. Christina Haas’s

study justified the speed and convenience of the Word Processor even though longhand rough

drafts have better content. If students can find the balance between releasing their ingenious

ideas onto paper and use (not abuse) the short cuts of word processing, then students will be suc-

cessful in the new electronic literacy world of today.

My survey showed that 74.3% of students use Word Processor for rough drafts, but only

50% believed Word Processor earned them a better grade. My statistics show that some students

that use Word Processor believe they would earn a better grade if they hand wrote their rough

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drafts first. My intensions of the survey came out of curiosity. I did not expect my results to help

me much with my research. I was surprised at how many students still wrote their rough drafts

by hand, and at how many actually thought they’d write a better draft by hand, too. Further re-

search should also study why word processors are favored by students and what specific tools in-

fluence them to choose the program over longhand writing. My survey also indicated that most

studies on the Word Processor and longhand writing may be too theoretical and do not incorpo-

rate the reality of how often students use the Word Processor and how every student has a differ-

ent way of composing their papers. Not every student needs to write their paper the same way,

but studies should be able to discover at what point in the writing process that word processors

will help writing whether it is after the rough draft and/or main ideas are jotted down.

Conclusion:

Through my research, I have realized that not only are word processors becoming more

popular in society, but also that it affects the content of our writing. My survey indicated that

students use word processors most of the time but have not completely eliminated any preplan-

ning strategies. With a majority of college students favoring word processors and teachers influ-

encing the program, writing content may be effected.

After word processing programs became popular in the 1980’s, Michael Heim wondered

if the new technology affected the quality of ideas in writing. He started his study immediately

after the program became popular among writers. Even though he felt his question would be an-

swered best if studied years down the road after Word Processors were used commonly, he still

believed that Word Processors made writing less intellectual than writing traditionally.

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Michael Heim hit it right on the spot, and according to my research, writing rough drafts

by longhand composes better content in papers than starting on Word Processor. A few studies

show that a writer is more intimate and connected to their work when they are able to physically

hold, touch, and see what they wrote on their paper. Other studies indicate that the Word Proces-

sor may be faster than writing by longhand, but the content quality is more spiritual when the

rough draft is written by hand. The Word Processor was originally invented to record mathemati-

cal and scientific data, not English literature. The program has obviously evolved into new soft-

ware, but that should not take away from the intimacy of writing by hand at some point during

the writing process.

A problem I encountered during my research was that most of the scholarly articles I read

were not from this decade. Most of the articles and books date back to the 1980s and 1990s. The

reason behind this is because that is when the Word Proccessor became popular. Anymore, the

Word Processor has accustomed in our society today that less research is done on the programs.

More current journals and experiments should be created. If more studies are able to incorporate

longhand writing and the use of word processors in writing processes, then more up to date ob-

servations can be made. Also, if students are able to include longhand writing in their rough

drafts and then the word processor into their final production, the content quality in papers would

improve for most students.

Works Cited

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Bangert-Drowns, Robert. “The Word Processor as an Instructional Tool: A Meta-Analysis of

Word Processing in Writing Instruction.” Review of Educational Research 3

(1993): 69- 93. Web. 1 Mar. 2010.

Chandler, Daniel. “The Phenomenology of Writing by Hand.” Digital Creativity (1992): 65-74.

Web. 7 Feb. 2010.

Haas, Christina. “How the Writing Medium Shapes the Writing Process: Effects of the Word

Processing on Planning.” Research in the Teaching of English 3 (1989): 181-

207. Web. 1 April. 2010.

---.Writing Technology Studies on the Materiality of Literacy.

Manwah: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Inc, 1996. Web. 26 Feb. 2010.

Heim, Michael. Electric Language: A Philosophical Study of Word Processing.

New

Haven & London: Yale University Press, 1987.Web. 1 Mar. 2010

Kellog, R.T. and Suzanne Mueller. “Performance Amplification and Process Restructuring in

Computer-based Writing.” Man-Machine Studies (1993): 33-49. Web. 10 Feb. 2010.

Lyman, Peter. “Reading, Writing, and Word Processing: Toward a Phenomenology of the

Computer Age.” Qualitative Sociology 7 (1984): 75-89. Web. 16 Feb. 2010.

Quinn, J.G. and G.E. Ralston. “Movement and Attention in Visual Working Memory.”

The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology Section A 38

(1986):689-703.

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Web. 5 April. 2010

Setzer, Valdemar and Lowell Monke. “Computers in Education: Why, When, How.” Chal-

lenging the applications: An Alternative Voice on Why When and How Com-

puters Should be Used in Education (1990):n.pag. Web. 29 Feb. 2010.