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Subject:Re: Fog Index, take II From:"Mysti Rubert" <mystilou -at- hotmail -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Sat, 01 Jun 2002 02:07:19 +0000
I believe that a PhD candidate will take longer to read and comprehend a
long, clause-riddled sentence with words that are unnecessarily complex
than she will take to read the same semantic content in brief, simple
sentences (in general, of course. Explaining needle-point or rocket science,
there's only so lean you can go!).
That she'll do it more quickly than a child who still sounds out syllables
is not the point.
The point is, if you write simple sentences, using the shortest words that
are still accurate and as complete as necessary, your readers will grasp the
material more quickly. This has been measure, no I don't have
sources at hand.
Something I learned in linguistics class: many readers comprehend material
by the phrase or sentence, not word by word. If your clauses are long and
stringy, your words many and unusual, that's harder to do. It slows the
reader down. Distracts them from their task of finding what they need to do
their job and makes them focus on the task of comprehension. Not usually a
good thing in a tech doc.
We're not talking philosophy hear, but eye movements.
I personally get annoyed when I have to read a sentence twice.
The highest compliment I ever got as a tech writer was "How did you make
this so easy to read?" And yes, it was accurate and complete.
Mysti
P.S. I think I forgot to introduce myself. Tech writer, 12 years experience,
five of it indie contractor. Hi everybody!
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