How important is a wrist rest on a keyboard?
Wrist rests are useful for providing a padded location to rest the base of the palm of the hand (never the wrist) when no keying is being done. A padded resting location is preferable to a hard surface or an edge of a worksurface because it distributes the pressure caused by the weight of the arm. The hand and the wrist should not be in contact with the pad while keying because this increases the intracarpal pressure and forces the wrist into an extended posture.
