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Researchers discovered 5 things we didn’t know about how we type

Most of us don't think about how we type — it's something we do everyday that is second nature at this point.

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But a study done by Aalto University in Finland found five surprising facts about how we type. The researchers used a motion capture system to study how people type — especially those who never took a formal typing course.

The motion capture system used 12 high-speed infrared cameras that tracked the position of 52 reflective markers placed on the hands and fingers.

Typing computer
Shutterstock/Syda Productions

Technology writer Joshua Topolsky directed us to the study's video via Twitter — here's what the research found:

You can type just as fast with 5 fingers

The researchers said the most surprising thing they found was that, on average, people who had never taken a typing course could type as fast as someone who learned to type with all 10 fingers.

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This was actually a weird quirk I discovered when I broke my pinky finger earlier this year. I thought it would have a huge impact on my typing skills, only to find that I actually only type with three fingers on my left hand and two on my right.

We all type very differently

My weird typing quirk is actually in line with what the researchers discovered: people type very differently and develop all sorts of strategies to type.

The study found there were four different strategies for typing on the left hand and six for the right hand. 

"In contrast to what you may expect, the number of fingers you use doesn't make you fast at typing," Daryl Weir, a postdoctoral researcher on the study, said in a video.

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A typing course doesn't always give you an edge

The researchers found that those who took a typing course weren't necessarily faster than those who never had taken one.

Everyone in the group used one of the strategies for typing mentioned earlier (four for the left and six for the right). Each time, people were typing very slowly or very fast, and a typing course didn't automatically mean they had an edge.

You can type without looking down even without formal training

The touch typing system is when people learn to type using all 10 of their fingers. The researchers found that people who had not gotten that kind of training were still able to type without look down.

However, touch typists looked at their hands much less than untrained typists.

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Your hands move very differently when typing

typing map
YouTube/Aalto University

This goes back to the different strategies the researchers found about how people type.

As the map shows, our left hand moves very differently from the right when typing. The study found that fast typists consistently used the same finger to press the same key every time.

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