The layout of QWERTY keyboards shapes our feelings about words

These days, writing is typing. And it looks as if the layout of QWERTY keyboards is influencing the way we feel about certain words.

Our relationship with the written word has changed in the last few years. We read words differently on a screen to how we read them on paper, for example. And using keyboards – both on phones and computers – has given rise to txtspk and popular acronyms such as “OMG” and “ROFL”.