A Comparative Exploration of the Distinctive Qualities of Oral, Handwritten and Typed Language in Memory and Recall

Cultural historians and philosophers have persuasively argued that the ways in which language is implemented either orally, in writing or in print, has a direct impact on cognition, and thus memory and recall. One strand of their argument contends that – once established – these different forms of implementation cannot be sharply separated or hierarchized as they form an ‘interiorised’ cognitive composite. While evidence for this is abundant in the phenomenal world, the investigators find that questions remain to be answered from a cognitive perspective. To this end a project was developed to explore the apparently intersecting but also differentiated cognitive processes involved in implementing oral, written and typed modes of learning. The investigators’ specific interests concern the relationship between language and graphic media in learning environments: specifically within Higher Education. An experiment was devised in which a pre-established lecture was delivered (to three different groups of participants) in three different formats: (1) following the oral tradition (i.e., including repetition, abundant use of epithets, etc.); (2) read from a script, and; (3) utilizing graphic ‘new media’ visual aids, namely, a PowerPoint slideshow. Immediately after the lecture participants were asked to: (1) recall the content of the lecture, and; (2) their general thoughts about the lecture. Results showed that participants in the oral lecture recalled less content than participants in the other two lecture formats. No significant differences were found in the amount of content recalled by participants in the scripted lecture and those in the PowerPoint lecture. All participants showed preference for lectures in which a combination of written material and new media are used. In addition, signs of an increased preference for computer-based note-taking were detected. The implications and potential applications of these results will be discussed.