A Princeton University student, Connor Diemand-Yauman, conducted the research, with the help of adviser Daniel Oppenheimer and Indiana University doctoral student Erikka Vaughan.

In a series of lab tests, volunteers were asked to memorize a set of physical characteristics attributed to hard-to-remember fictional names of an alien species. Some of the lists were rendered in either Comic Sans MS or Bodini MT, fonts considered difficult to read. The other lists were rendered in the more appealing Arial font.

Those who read the characteristics in the fonts that were difficult to read, or "disfluent" as the researchers called them, scored 14 percent better on the memory test than those who read the Arial font.

The researchers also found this improved performance holds in the classroom as well. Classroom presentations and worksheets for 222 Ohio high school students were rendered in three highly disfluent fonts -- Haettenschweiler, Monotype Corsiva and Comic Sans Italicized. The students with these materials learned the material more thoroughly than their peers who used the original material, the researchers reported.

Of course, such findings may not surprise individuals who render their written messages in all capital letters to get their ideas across, . On the other hand, keepers of the Ban Comic Sans , which rails against the use of inappropriately used typography, might want to reconsider their stance.