Chheung 1

Chheavhong Chheung
Tyler Branson
Writing 2
May 27, 2016
Writing Habits Analysis
I.

Introduction

Most of us have an ideal time of the day that we believe is the perfect time to write. Some
of us may prefer the serenity of the early morning, before the sun rises and before the world gets
up. Some prefer to do most of our writing as we move through the day. And some of us like to
write late at night because the tranquility of the night makes us feel like we are the most
productive. Is there an optimal time of day where our brain is working at its peak and our
productivity level is heightened?
Research has shown that there is a significant level of correlation between time of day
and productivity. In fact, according to Nolan G. Popes article, How the Time of Day Affects
Productivity: Evidence From School Schedules, productivity is higher in the morning than the
afternoon and that this variation in productivity can be exploited to increase efficiency (p. 10).
In this experiment, Pope studied how rearranging morning and afternoon class schedules can
have on students performance based on grades and California Standards Test scores. The
findings that productivity is higher in the morning are based on two dimensions in which
morning classes and afternoon classes are flipped to test the effect of time of day on student
performance. In this case, productivity is defined as performance.
In a Wall Street Journal article, The Peak Time for Everything, Sue Shellenbarger
states, that paying attention to the body clock, and its effects on energy and alertness, can help
pinpoint the different times of day when most of us perform our best at specific tasks, from
resolving conflicts to thinking creatively (1). She emphasizes that our bodys circadian rhythm

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dictates that cognition is at its peak in the late morning because our body temperature have
stabilized by then and our working memory, alertness and concentration have already improved.
In this study, I investigated my own writing habits and how it works in my specific
literate practices. Because I am a student in college, most of my writing is for academic
purposes, so I wanted to find out whether the time of day affected my productivity.
II.

Methodology

For this analysis, I recorded characteristics of every instance of literate activity over a
six-day period in a writing log electronically, most often in the form of a word doc. Then I
analyzed my data and coded it for certain themes, patterns, or genres that emerged. For each
night during the six-day period, I logged all the writing I did for that day. Initially, I began
logging my writing on May 4th, but I skipped a few days and began logging again on May 9th. I
continued on to log for the next four days and ended on Friday, May 13th.
I logged what I was writing, why I was writing it, the audience for my writing, the
technology I use, where I was physically, the time it took me to write, the word count, and the
time of day. After the first few days, I noticed certain patterns that was repeated so I disregarded
the technology I used, because it was either my iPhone or my computer, and the audience of my
writing, because it was mainly for myself or my friends. I began to pay particular attention to
what I was writing the most, the time of day, and the word count and I noticed there was another
pattern. Thus, at the end of the six-day period, I decided to code my data in terms of time of day
and word count. I chose to table the date, the word count, and divided the time of day into three
five-hours increments (7am-12pm, 12pm-5pm, 5pm-10pm).
Table 1. Writing log
Date

Words

Time

5/4/16

160

12 p.m. -5 p.m.

5/9/16

912
485

7 a.m. -12 p.m.

12 p.m. -5 p.m.

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5/10/16

1,004
153

7 a.m. -12 p.m.

5 p.m. -10 p.m.

5/11/16

320
474

7 a.m. -12 p.m.

5 p.m. -10 p.m.

5/12/16

682
321

7 a.m. -12 p.m.

12 p.m. -5 p.m.

5/13/16

402
56
123

7 a.m. -12 p.m.

12 p.m. -5 p.m.
5 p.m. -10 p.m.

III.

Result

The results are as followed. I took all the word counts for each time slots and I added
them up. I found that for 7 a.m. -12 p.m. across the six-day period, I wrote a total number of
3,320 words overall, and for 12 p.m. -5 p.m. across the six-day period, I wrote a total amount of
1,022 words, and finally, for 5 p.m. -10 p.m. across the six-day period, I wrote 750 words.

7 a.m. -12 p.m.

12 p.m. -5 p.m.

5 p.m. -10 p.m.

3,320 words

1,022 words

750 words

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Time of Day vs. Word Count

3,500
3,000
2,500
Words

2,000
1,500
1,000
500
0
7am-12pm

12pm-5pm

IV.

5pm-10pm

Discussion

As my results have shown, my findings are consistent with that of Nolan Pope and Sue
Shellenbarger in that my productivity level is increased/optimized in the morning rather than in
the afternoon or at night. Note that this study defines word counts as productivity. In that sense,
the more words I write, the more productive I am. I am far more productive in the hours of 7 a.m.
to 12 p.m. than I am in the hours of 12 p.m. to 10 p.m. I hope that by understanding my writing

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habits, it will help me plan future class and study schedules in the mornings so that it is tailored
to increase my productivity and performance. I would like to point out that this study was a
simply snapshot of my writing habits. Some weeks, I tend to write more and some weeks I will
write less, depending on what courses I am taking and the importance of the subject.

Works Cited
1. Pope, Nolan G. How the Time of Day Affects Productivity: Evidence from School
Schedules. The Review of Economics and Statistics: Vol. XCVIII (I). March 2016. Web.
May 2016.
2. Shellenbarger, Sue. The Peak Time for Everything: Pack More in a Day by Matching Tasks
to the Bodys Energy; Lung Power at 5 p.m. The Wall Street Journal. 26, Sept. 2016. Web.
May 2016.