A Comparison of the Straight-Copy Skill Scores of Students Who Began Their Training on Electric Typewriters with Students Who Began Training on Non-Electric Typewriters

The purpose of this study was (a) to discover if there are significant differences in the straight-copy skill scores of two groups of typewriting students at the end of one year of instruction— one group began their instruction on electric typewriters and the other on manuals; (b) to obtain student opinion concerning electric and manual typewriters. The study was conducted during the 1965-1966 school year at the Austin High School, Austin, Minnesota. A total of one hundred twenty-one students made up the experimental groups. Significant findings were (1) Beginning typewriting students who start on the electric typewriter tend to have a slightly higher score in words per minute at the end of one semester of typewriting than those who begin on the manual; (2) After students change machines, ~ the group trained initially on manuals increase their speed more rapidly than do those who start on electrics; (5) Students who begin instruction on manual machines tend to show a higher rate of increase from the first semester to the second semester than do those who begin on electric typewriters; (4) There are no significant differences in the straight- , , „ _ ( 1 copy skill scores of beginning typewriting students at the end of one year of instruction regardless of whether training was initiated on the manual or electric machine; (5 ) A majority of students prefer the electric to the manual typewriter; (6) An overwhelming majority of students believe the electric to be faster than the manual typewriter; (7) Students who change from one machine to another tend to believe they make more errors on the machine they last used; (8) A majority of beginning typewriting students have a typewriter available at home. These typewriters are usually manual machines