Kiefer Markus, Schuler Stefanie, Mayer Carmen, Trumpp Natalie M, Hille Katrin, Sachse Steffi
Department of Psychiatry, Ulm University, Ulm, Germany.
ZNL Transfer Center for Neuroscience and Learning, Ulm University, Ulm, Germany.
Adv Cogn Psychol. 2015 Dec 31;11(4):136-46. doi: 10.5709/acp-0178-7. eCollection 2015.
Digital writing devices associated with the use of computers, tablet PCs, or mobile phones are increasingly replacing writing by hand. It is, however, controversially discussed how writing modes influence reading and writing performance in children at the start of literacy. On the one hand, the easiness of typing on digital devices may accelerate reading and writing in young children, who have less developed sensory-motor skills. On the other hand, the meaningful coupling between action and perception during handwriting, which establishes sensory-motor memory traces, could facilitate written language acquisition. In order to decide between these theoretical alternatives, for the present study, we developed an intense training program for preschool children attending the German kindergarten with 16 training sessions. Using closely matched letter learning games, eight letters of the German alphabet were trained either by handwriting with a pen on a sheet of paper or by typing on a computer keyboard. Letter recognition, naming, and writing performance as well as word reading and writing performance were assessed. Results did not indicate a superiority of typing training over handwriting training in any of these tasks. In contrast, handwriting training was superior to typing training in word writing, and, as a tendency, in word reading. The results of our study, therefore, support theories of action-perception coupling assuming a facilitatory influence of sensory-motor representations established during handwriting on reading and writing.
与计算机、平板电脑或手机使用相关的数字书写设备正越来越多地取代手写。然而，关于书写模式如何影响儿童识字初期的阅读和书写能力，存在着争议。一方面，在数字设备上打字的便捷性可能会加快幼儿的阅读和书写速度，因为他们的感觉运动技能发育尚不完善。另一方面，手写过程中动作与感知之间的有意义耦合会建立感觉运动记忆痕迹，这可能有助于书面语言的习得。为了在这些理论选择之间做出决定，在本研究中，我们为上德国幼儿园的学龄前儿童制定了一个强化训练计划，共16节训练课。使用紧密匹配的字母学习游戏，通过在纸上用钢笔手写或在电脑键盘上打字的方式对德语字母表中的八个字母进行训练。对字母识别、命名和书写能力以及单词阅读和书写能力进行了评估。结果表明，在这些任务中，打字训练并不优于手写训练。相反，手写训练在单词书写方面优于打字训练，在单词阅读方面也有一定的优势。因此，我们的研究结果支持了动作-感知耦合理论，该理论认为手写过程中建立的感觉运动表征对阅读和书写有促进作用。
