Readability of documentation for end user searchers

Abstract

Measures of readability, which assess the expected difficulty in reading a specific text, provide one means of assessing the quality of documentation for computer‐based systems. In this study documentation designed for physicians searching the PDQ cancer database was analyzed using readability formulae in AT&T's Writer's Workbench software package. The user manuals' reading grades ranged from tenth to thirteenth grade levels. This should be appropriate under normal circumstances for sophisticated searchers such as physicians. However, the distractions that are common in many online environments can decrease reader comprehension at any level.

Citation

Shaw, D. (1989), "Readability of documentation for end user searchers", Online Review, Vol. 13 No. 1, pp. 3-8. https://doi.org/10.1108/eb024296