The relationship between the use of digital writing and the quality of spelling

Abstract

The impact of the use of digital writing on the quality of spelling is regularly thought to be negative by the general public. Generally speaking, studies that focused on the impact of the use of digital writing on the quality of spelling production opposed modification skills – which refer to digital writing – to literacy skills – which refer to standard writing. If this comparison may become a real track to determine the kind of such impact, the task appears to be very complex. However, studies conducted in this research field lead to different results that need to be discussed. This theoretical article aims at synthesizing recent works that dealt with this issue and to shed light on the kind of impact digital writing may have on users spelling performances. Two tracks will be presented in order to identify the kind of this eventual impact: the first will focus on the orthographic depth and the second on the modifications that may be confused with misspellings.