Is handwriting better than typing for journaling?

Is Handwriting Better Than Typing for Journaling?

written by Ana

posted on Nov 08, 2022

In today’s fast-paced world it’s easier to reach for a keyboard on our phones or computers to type something rather than write with a pen on paper.

When it comes to journaling, many people prefer to make their entries digitally most of the time. It has also become quite popular to audio journal using an app on your phone.

Journaling is well-known for its benefits when it comes to processing emotions, unleashing creativity and keeping track of your workflow.

But do you get all the pros of journaling when typing instead of writing by hand?

To answer this question, we’ve looked at the research studies examining this topic. I also tried journaling by hand and by typing for a month to see if there’s a difference.

So, is it better to write or type a journal?

Although typing in a journal is faster, easier and more convenient to keep a record of information, if you are journaling for mindfulness to better understand your feelings or creativity to generate new ideas, then writing by hand in a journal is better.

To answer this question in more detail, we need to understand what happens in our brains when writing.

So, let’s find out!

What happens to your brain when handwriting?

The neuroscience of creative writing reveals that a wide network of areas in the brain work together when people write. When you brainstorm ideas and then write creatively by hand, vision-processing regions of the brain become activated suggesting that you imagine the scenes you want to write about.

The hippocampus becomes activated when you start writing because you remember stuff that happened that you describe in words.

These results were obtained from a study conducted by researchers at the University of Greifswald (Germany) led by Dr Lotze using fMRI scanners to find regions that get activated in the brain during creative writing.

Another study looking at language development in kids found that when children are writing letters by hand, they expressed more ideas.

Moreover, an EEG study analyzed brain electrical activity when a group of young adults and children were handwriting, typing on a keyboard or drawing words.

They found that when you’re writing by hand, the way you learn and memorize new information improves.

Finally, when writing by hand you are not only activating your motor cortex – the area of the brain responsible for movement – to make subtle and complicated moves with your fingers, but also activating the language networks in the central and temporal lobes used for communication and networks used for reading and spelling.

The increased activity in the motor cortex of the brain is also seen when people meditate. That’s why writing in a journal by hand can have therapeutic effects and is a form of mindfulness similar to meditation.

Overall, it’s important that adults also engage in handwriting activities when there is a chance to maintain neuronal patterns in the brain that are vital for learning.

Therefore, if we rely on the evidence from brain science, it’s better to write in your journal by hand!

Here’s what I found when only typing for journaling:

As someone who spends anywhere from 8 to 10 hours in front of the computer screen every day, I can say that I wasn’t looking forward to typing my journal entries.

However, I like how speedy typing is and I can use a search function, can easily categorize my entries, insert pictures and tick off tasks on my to-do list.

I definitely noticed that I get more done when I type everything. Usually, I have my to-dos, studying notes and work plans in Notion pages so I just used a default Journal template to keep my journal entries.

That’s what I like about journaling by hand:

To be completely honest with you, I really missed writing in a journal by hand that month when I was only typing. Taking my favorite notebook and going to the kitchen to make a cup of green tea and then transferring my thoughts to a blank sheet is a solid part of my morning routine that I love.

There’s also something magical about the feel of a paper notebook. Whenever I note down my thoughts on a piece of paper by hand, I personally feel very relieved and better reflect on what I wrote.

In addition, I also felt more creative when handwriting my ideas in the notebook.

The only way to find out if there’s a difference in benefits you get from journaling by hand vs typing is by conducting an experiment.

In a neuroscience lab, we would recruit participants and assign them to two groups – people typing on the computers for journaling and people writing by hand in the notebooks.

Then we would give them questionnaires asking questions related to how they felt after journaling sessions.

A statistical analysis of the results would reveal whether journaling by hand or typing has more benefits.

Amber, from WritingThroughLife did something similar – she asked her readers to take part in an experiment where 12 people journaled on the computer for one week and then the same people journaled by hand the next week. She asked them to rate each entry on a scale from 1 to 3 (1=Not at all, 2=Some, and 3=Quite a bit) and summarized the results:

As you can see the results for hand vs. computer were quite similar!

Do you write in your journal by hand or prefer to quickly type everything on your computer? Let’s discuss it in the comments section down below!

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With better awareness, better results 🙂

A&A

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