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Comment by keiferski | Hacker News Reader

This study appears to focus on short term memory, but for my money, long-term memory is much more significant. As such, it would have been useful to add a third option: using a SRS system like Anki. I imagine it would significantly outcompete both hand-written notes and digital tablet notes. A bit like the famous Steve Jobs example comparing a human, a condor, and a human with a bicycle. The condor (hand-writing) may beat the human (tablet), but a human with a bicycle (SRS system) outcompetes both.

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One hour isn't really short-term memory, at least not in the usual sense, and short-term memory is definitely needed to form long-term memories.

Spaced repetition is an entirely different dimension. It doesn't fit between the three mentioned modes. You don't get spaced repetition when e.g. attending class or reading a chapter. Instead, you make notes. That's what this study is for, and anything else is a distraction.

My point was more that if you’re trying to decide which method is better for remembering something (handwriting vs. digital), the introduction of a spaced repetition system (either software like Anki or a Leitner box for handwritten notes) will outcompete either one that is used alone.

In other words, if your goal is to go fast: a bicycle will outcompete a tricycle. But adding a motor to either will be an order of magnitude better. At least that’s what I think; and so I wish the study had included this.

> My point was more that if you’re trying to decide which method is better for remembering something (handwriting vs. digital), the introduction of a spaced repetition system (either software like Anki or a Leitner box for handwritten notes) will outcompete either one that is used alone.

The study in question compared three groups (pen & paper note taking, smartphone and tablet) on information retrieval and note taking duration after reading a dialogue.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding your point, but that systematic spaced repetition will lead to better information retrieval is kind of obvious and has a lot of literature to support it, but how is it relevant to this study?

Because the original link submission title was more about memory and writing vs. typing. And so I was commenting on the topic of memory as a whole.

Judging by the other comments, most people had the same interpretation.

> I was commenting on the topic of memory as a whole

You specifically said that the study was lacking a fourth group (spaced repetition software.)

You I seem to be posting hostile, unhelpful takes all over this thread, so I think I’ll end the conversation here.

Studying isn't note-taking. It doesn't make sense for this study to include it. It's a different modality, a different task. If the study had included this, it would have been tossed aside in peer-review. You can't compare across widely differing conditions. An fMRI study also isn't the appropriate way to compare conditions in very long term recollection tasks, and get the result you seem to want to get out of it: the proper way to do it is scoring the test result.

The implicitions of this study are limited, as usual.

I agree with your thoughts on digital notes providing an advantage with making flashcards, as they match with my personal experience with learning new subjects.

I used to learn with handwriting more than digital note-taking in the past, but I found it hard to convert the handwritten notes into a flashcard format (the best I could do was retype, or write the notes in a question-answer format, scan them, and use the screenshots as flashcards).

By starting with digital notes, however, the process became simpler for making flashcards for a spaced repetition system—it became much easier to reformat the text for digital flashcards. I then found it much easier to review my notes in the future in a way that actively tested me, versus passively re-reading my handwritten notes.

Isn't that fairly obvious? You need to repeat the work for this kind of stuff.

I can say that SRS reading pales in comparison to SRS writing when it comes to learning Japanese.

I don't understand your simile. The limitations of a bicycle are infrastructure: bicycles can go a lot of places very efficiently, but rugged mountain terrain without trails (precisely the place condors thrive) would be difficult to traverse. (this is totally off topic but now i am curious about the energy efficiency of condor flight vs bicycle travel in ideal conditions)

i find SRS very useful. but i personally think it is not well suited to reference information. i'm skeptical of putting all my appointments in SRS for example (maybe birthdays would be worth it). or say I had collected a bunch of papers related to a topic I was very interested in. I don't necessarily think I'd want to memorize the list of them via SRS, but having the titles written somewhere for reference would be great. I think the point of this paper is that if that 'somewhere' is an SRS card, it is almost completely devoid of context (other than 'studying flashcards on computer' context), but if that somewhere is a notebook that contains lists of papers related to all the topics i'm interested in, it's much easier to find. (though computers are good at searching fast)

It was just an example used by Steve Jobs to show how computers could enhance human capabilities.

Also, using a SRS in conjunction with a memory palace can solve a lot of the reference issues you’re describing.

this combo technique sounds useful, is it something like reviewing memory palaces with spaced repetition, instead of reviewing standalone information?

Something like that, yeah. The idea being that you create a memory palace or physical space, and then memorize a map or route through it via spaced repetition.

Memory palaces are often recommended for reference-type information, so I think this would work well. There are a number of discussions on Art of Memory talking about this:

https://forum.artofmemory.com/t/mind-mapping-memory-techniqu...

https://forum.artofmemory.com/t/anki-to-load-up-a-memory-pal...

Just a very small nitpick, but "system" is redundant when you say SRS, as it would be like saying Spaced Repetition System system.

SRS = spaced repetition software.

A shoutout to SuperMemo here - one of the oldest SRS out there. Their first version was on Amiga, if I remember correctly, and the newest ones support iOS, use LLMs and all the other tech :)

iOS? No, certainly not. The recently released version just did the jump from Internet Explorer to Edge support.

You probably mean the confusingly identically named SuperMemo on supermemo.com (not .guru), that is indeed a spaced-repetition software, but is not the venerable and famous real SuperMemo with a gazillion of features and research behind it. Just a simplistic knockoff. Strangely by the same author.

I’ve never used Supermemo (still windows-only I think) but the data on their blog is really awesome. The founder basically pioneered the idea of SRS.

Spaced repetition software system? That's not the usual meaning of SRS, but good to know some people use it like that.

Good to know but these days if you try to google it that's not the result unfortunately.

>This study appears to focus on short term memory, but for my money, long-term memory is much more significant. As such, it would have been useful to add a third option: using a SRS system like Anki

Then you should go tell the journal editors that this study is incomplete and didn't cover the type of memory you consider more significant, hopefully they will retract the paper

What's an SRS system?

Software that prompts you with information on some time interval that allows for embedding it deeper in your memory. I think the key was it would prompt you with the information, just as your short term memory would be about to forget it, and thus re-inforce it.

So some information X you want to remember.

It would prompt you with it at 5 minutes, then 20, then an hour, then 5 hours.

I forget the durations, but it was based in some studies on time before short term memory fades.

I think it is Space Repetition Software/System

Spaced Repetition Software.

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