How to make text understandable

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monira444
Posts: 492
Joined: Sat Dec 28, 2024 4:36 am

How to make text understandable

Post by monira444 »

In writing, as in any other skill, there is no limit to perfection. And many books have been written about how to make your style clearer. In addition to the already mentioned Chukovsky, it is worth reading "Write, Cut" by L. Sarycheva and M. Ilyakhov. And foreign authors recommend the guide "Elements of Style" by William Strunk to improve their writing skills.

Without claiming to be complete, I will share some of my approaches to making the text understandable.

Test for readability. Conduct a simple user test. After giving your text to a colleague, friend or neighbor in the parking lot, mark all the places where the reader has difficulty. Ask them to retell the bolivia mobile database main ideas from what they read. A simplified version of this test is to read it out loud on your own. Pay attention to how easy it is for you to pronounce phrases, whether you have enough breath to the punctuation mark or to the end of the sentence.

Show a movie. Imagine that a movie is being made based on your text. Pay attention to what the camera is pointed at and start describing objects, people, and what is happening in the frame. Draw animated pictures for the reader. Use a simple word order with the following structure: “The granddaughter threw the ball at the Beetle” — direct presentation is easier for the brain to digest.

Add dynamism. Replace verbal nouns with verbs. Nominalizations turn a film into a static picture. Use action verbs and attributive adverbs (“quickly”, “easily”, etc.). For example, instead of “Building an appropriate management system at an enterprise ensures increased labor efficiency”, it is better to write: “Start managing, and employees will easily do 2 times more in 1 working day”.

Reveal the details. People tend to generalize, and this adds vagueness to the text. General phrases are good only because they do not cause criticism, it is easier to agree with them, since they do not have specifics. Here, for example: "We guarantee short lead times and product quality." On the one hand, it's to the point, on the other, such a text is no better than a bar of laundry soap.

Clarifying questions help to reveal the details:
"What exactly do you mean by short lead times?"
"How exactly do you guarantee quality?"

We get the following text: "Your order will be ready in 15 days or earlier. If you are not satisfied with the quality, the goods can be returned within 30 working days from the date of receipt."

Take breaks to breathe. It’s easier to eat an elephant one piece at a time, and it’s easier to read a text if it consists of short sentences and small paragraphs. While reading, our brain constantly processes and interprets incoming words. This information is placed in short-term memory, a kind of buffer, and remains there until its meaning is comprehended. Always take into account the limited volume of the reader’s buffer. Experience has shown that it is no more than 15 words. Fortunately, the buffer is cleared the moment the reader reaches the logical conclusion of a separate thought in the text. To optimize work with the reader’s buffer, I use the following approaches:
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