Writers and writing teachers should be wary of depending on readability indexes as indicators of the difficulty of written messages. The Gunning Fog Index and the Damerst Clear Index, two readability formulas, were used to determine the readability of "A Statement of Editorial Policy" and two abstracts appearing in an issue of…

Concludes that nominal writing style, substituting nouns for verbs, adversely affects reader interest and reading speed. (FL)

Describes two studies on the comprehension of pharmaceutical text containing pictorial and written instructions by mothers in rural Kenya. Comprehension of printed instructions was compared with interpretation of illustrations, propositional analysis used in the study is explained, recall protocols are examined, and implications of writing…

Eighteen naval fire technicians served as subjects in a study using scenarios to simulate a real world task for assessing the readability of general technical texts. The scenario asked subjects to read a segment of text and to explain to a colleague how the particular component described in the passage functioned. Subjects' summaries were assessed…

To provide a rationale for textbook evaluation, a study examined the major and minor topics covered in 20 selected college-level business communication textbooks, the readability level presented for each text, and the number of schools currently using the text. (HOD)