science

Readability

Readability is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Readability rather than just read about it. In short: Readability is the ease with which a reader can understand a written text. The concept exists in both natural language and programming languages, though in different forms.

Key takeaways

Readability belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Readability to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Readability from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Readability is the ease with which a reader can understand a written text. The concept exists in both natural language and programming languages, though in different forms. In natural language, the readability of text depends on its content (the complexity of its vocabulary and syntax) and its presentation (such as typographic aspects that affect legibility, like font size, line height, character spacing, and line length). In programming, things such as programmer comments, choice of loop structure, and choice of names can determine the ease with which humans can read computer program code. Higher readability in a text eases reading effort and speed for the general population of readers. For those who do not have high reading comprehension, readability is necessary for understanding and applying a given text. Techniques to simplify readability are essential to communicate a set of information to the intended audience.

Definition The term "readability" is inherently broad and can become confusing when examining all of the possible definitions. Readability is a concept that involves audience, content, quality, legibility, and can even involve the formatting and design structure of any given text. Different definitions of readability exist from various sources. The definition fluctuates based on the type of audience to whom one is presenting a certain type of content. For example, a technical writer might focus on clear and concise language and formatting that allows easy-reading. In contrast, a scholarly journal would use sophisticated writing that would appeal and make sense to the type of audience to whom they are directing information.

Applications Readability is essential to the clarity and accessibility of texts used in classrooms, work environments, and everyday life. Much research has focused on matching prose to reading skill, resulting in formulas for use in research, government, teaching, publishing, the military, medicine, and business. Readability measurement in non-English languages has also been the focus of various studies. The two publications with the largest circulations, TV Guide (13 million) and Reader's Digest (12 million), are written at the 9th-grade level. The most popular novels are written at the 7th-grade level. This supports the fact that the average adult reads at the 9th-grade level. It also shows that, for recreation, people read texts that are two grades below their actual reading level.

History

Early research For centuries, teachers and educators have seen the importance of organization, coherence, and emphasis in good writing. In the 1880s, English professor L. A. Sherman found that the English sentence was getting shorter. In Elizabethan times, the average sentence was 50 words long while in Sherman's modern time, it was 23 words long. In 1889 in Russia, the writer Nikolai A. Rubakin published a study of over 10,000 texts written by everyday people. From these texts, he took 1,500 words he thought most people understood. He found that the main blocks to comprehension are unfamiliar words and long sentences. Starting with his own journal at the age of 13, Rubakin published many articles and books on science and many subjects for the great numbers of new readers throughout Russia. In Rubakin's view, the people were not fools. They were simply poor and in need of cheap books, written at a level they could grasp.

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Readability

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Readability claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Readability before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Readability ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Readability

In research: Readability appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Readability in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Readability is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Learning to read, Plain English, Readability, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Readability outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Readability in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Readability means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Readability out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Readability in simple terms?

Readability is the ease with which a reader can understand a written text. The concept exists in both natural language and programming languages, though in different forms.

Why does Readability matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Readability?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Readability.