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Legal Writing

: Building Rapport

Perceptions of Audience Awareness

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When you want to write in plain language, it is important to distinguish between

your concept of plain language and your reader's.

A reader decides whether to read your material based on the reader's judgement whether the material:

looks interesting
appears useful
seems easy to read

Putting aside the reader's search for interesting and useful, what will seem easy to read?

As the reader scans the page and picks out a phrase here and there, the decision is reached according to the reader's idea of easy reading.

I have found that most over-educated people (as in too many years in the ivory tower) have a limited awareness of the average reader's capabilities.

If you aim to write always in plain language, then you should inform yourself. Keep up with the relevant news.

Here are 3 items from today alone:

1.

University professors feel their first-year students are less mature, rely too much on Wikipedia and "expect success without the requisite effort,"
http://www.thestar.com/News/Ontario/article/614219

2.
British teenagers have lower IQ scores than a generation ago, new study reveals
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1139062/British-teenagers-lower-IQ-scores-generation-ago-new-study-reveals.html

3.
First 2 Words: A Signal for the Scanning Eye
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/nanocontent.html

Full post as published by Building Rapport on April 06, 2009 (boomark / email).

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