Typed Versus Handwritten Lecture Notes and College Student Achievement: A Meta-Analysis

Many college students prefer to type their lecture notes rather than write them by hand. As a result, the number of experimental and quasi-experimental studies comparing these two note-taking mediums has flourished over the past decade. The present meta-analytic research sought to uncover trends in the existing studies comparing achievement and note-taking outcomes among college students. Results from 24 separate studies across 21 articles revealed that taking and reviewing handwritten notes leads to higher achievement (Hedges’ g = 0.248; p