Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!hplabs!hp-pcd!hpcvlx!bturner
From: bturner@hpcvlx.HP.COM (Bill Turner)
Newsgroups: comp.text
Subject: Re: Urban Legends (was Re: Dvorak Keyboard Layout)
Message-ID: <101870006@hpcvlx.HP.COM>
Date: 20 Jul 89 16:50:49 GMT
References: <787@dms.UUCP>
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Co., Corvallis, OR, USA
Lines: 16

> ...The experiments showing
> the superiority of the Dvorak keyboard are mainly old, were done by people who
> were actively trying to prove that superiority, and are not up to modern
> experimental standards.  Recent data - I've been told the references by some-
> one who works in the field, but I'm afraid I don't have them - show that there
> is actually only a small difference in typing speed between Dvorak and Scholes
> typists.

One study that I know of was done in part by Donald Norman (author of "The
Phsychology of Everyday Things" and professor in the Department of Cognitive
Science at UCSD) -- the paper is "Why Alphabetic Keyboads Are Not Easy to Use:
Keyboard Layout Doesn't Much Matter" by Donald A. Norman and Diane Fisher 
(Human Factors, vol. 24 no. 5, 1982, pp 509-519)

--Bill Turner (bturner@hp-pcd.hp.com)
HP Corvallis Information Systems