Transcription (Retyping) Analysis

What it is and how it should be used.

What transcription means here

Transcription is reproducing text that already exists — copying from a page, a second screen, or a phone — by typing it out instead of composing it.

We use the term "Transcription" in our analyses to denote a spectrum of behaviors with Original composition on one end and Transcription on the other.

This matters because retyping finished text is one way to produce a session that looks like work without the work of composing. It's also something ordinary writers do for innocent reasons. Both are true, and we want to be clear about that, because PoE is not about "catching" cheaters; it's about protecting honest writers.

Different modes leave different shapes

When a person composes, the session carries the marks of thinking: pauses where ideas form, revisions where sentences get reconsidered, bursts and hesitations that follow the argument rather than the mechanics of typing.

When we transcribe, the shape tends to flatten — steadier and more linear, the rhythm of reading-and-reproducing rather than composing. PoE observes the shape of our writing and reports it, nothing more. It becomes a reliable data point upon which to have informed conversations.

In this sample, we see the Cognitive Waveform and the corresponding Document Section of the Transcription Signal bar. The first Document Section measures a green Authentic pattern, while the second section scores as Transcribed with High confidence. The Waveform shows a noisier more spread out and varied first half, which is typical of original composition. The second half is more compressed towards the center and less varied, which resembles a more linear pattern closer to transcription. While it isn’t reliable to use the Waveform alone to determine if someone transcribed, when comparing a person to themselves, it is usually the case that their transcription pattern is visually distinct from their authentic pattern.

Where PoE is strongest

Genuine composition leaves a rich, distinctive signal — and the more real the effort, the clearer it is. On high-stakes, high-effort writing — the graded essay, the submitted manuscript, the professional document — the difference between composing and copying is most visible, because sustained composition produces a shape that's hard to mistake for anything else.

This is the work PoE is built for. Where the effort is real, the record shows it clearly, and an honest writer's session looks unmistakably like what it is.

The honest limit: A spectrum, not two boxes

Writing isn't simply "authentic" or "transcribed." Writing falls along a range of effort — from heavy, non-linear composition at one end, through ordinary writing, down to quick linear work like journaling, and finally to transcription, where nothing is being originally composed at that moment.

Toward the lower-effort end, an honest but linear session and a transcribed one can look similar. That overlap is real, and something writers and reviewers need to be aware of.

The overlap is also why the tool is scoped the way it is: on high-stakes, high-effort work the signal is strong and clear; on low-stakes or intentionally linear writing, it's weaker, and PoE reports this spectrum by labeling a "Transcribed" section of a document by confidence level, Low, Medium and High.

What can be said with confidence is that portions of a text that measure on the Transcribed spectrum demonstrate less effort than those that measure Authentic. This will often be corroborated by some combination of low editing scores, compressed waveform, low number of writing sessions and shorter active time.