• Journal of the Ergonomics Society of Korea
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.21-33
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• 2007

The study investigates the effects of luminance contrast, which is the contrast between text color and background color, on readability in VDT environments. Our research goals are to prove that the relationship between luminance contrast and readability is not linear and to explore the best luminance contrast level for optimal readability. We conducted two pretests before the main experiment to determine the operational readability and luminance contrast levels. We also conducted a controlled main experiment, in which luminance contrast, reading amount and screen size were tested in terms of its relation with readability. The results of the main experiment indicate that the readability has a non-linear relation with luminance contrast, and the optimal readability is obtained when the contrast is equal to 0.951. Furthermore, the non-linear function and optional point stay constant regardless of screen size and reading amount. The paper ends with implications of the results that maximal contrast does not always mean the optimal readability.

• Korean Journal of Health Education and Promotion
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• v.29 no.5
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• pp.27-36
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• 2012

Objectives: Developing efficient health messages is important for improving health behaviors at a societal level. This study attempts to test a few variables that could constitute the elements for measuring readability of health message. The number of subject-verb relationships in a sentence, placement of jargon, i.e., explication before or after each jargon, and the number of less familiar Chinese characters were manipulated to hypothetically differentiate readability. Methods: In a $2{\times}2$ mixed factorial experiment, 152 college students read two health messages regarding side effect of health functional food and energy drink. The participants' perceived readability was asked, and eight questions were developed to measure the participants' recognition of the health information. Results: Those who read messages manipulated to have high readability rated the message significantly higher than those who read messages with low readability. Also, the former answered the questions more correctly than the latter, implying the association between readability and knowledge acquisition regarding health. Conclusions: Readability is suggested as a factor determining the effect of health messages in affecting the public's health risk perception and relevant behaviors. Further studies to sophisticate the measurement itself and to examine the effect of actual public messages with different readabilities are suggested.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.20 no.10
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• pp.25-34
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• 2020

Community question and answering service is one of the main sources of information and knowledge in the Web. The quality of information in question and answer documents is determined by the clarity of the question and the relevance of the answers, and the readability of a document is a key factor for evaluating the quality. This study is to measure the quality of documents used in community question and answering service. For this purpose, we compare the frequency of occurrence by vocabulary level used in community documents and measure the readability index of documents by institution of author. To measure the readability index, we used the Dale-Chall formula which is calculated by vocabulary level and sentence length. The results show that the vocabulary used in the answers is more difficult than in the questions and the sentence length is longer. The gap in readability between questions and answers is also found by writing institution. The results of this study can be used as basic data for improving online counseling services.

• Korean Journal of Community Nutrition
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.648-655
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• 2010

This study is attempted to propose a quality evaluation method of the materials for nutrition education by applying readability test of printed materials for nutrition education. It is significantly important for the teaching class with nutrition education materials to consider students understanding level and education materials topics or choosing words in developed printed materials. This study performed an evaluation of the readability of text in teachers' guidebook, which is devised for elementary school students' education material about sugar, sodium and trans-fat and attempted to estimate the developing materials through analyzing difficulty level of the text. We utilized "The Teacher's Guidebook for Cooking Activity" that had been developed for elementary school by Ministry Education Science and Technology, as the readability evaluation standard. Compared with the average score of readability about "The Teacher's Guidebook for Cooking Activity", $72.94{\pm}6.85$, "Sugar Guidebook" was 70.94{\pm}7.46, "Sodium Guidebook" was $68.76{\pm}14.50$, and "Trans-fat Guidebook" was $58.87{\pm}10.79$. Considering the subjects careers or ages, "The Teacher's Guidebook for Cooking Activity" has little deviation by the subjects careers or ages and was "intermediate" or "easy" level; however, "Sugar Guidebook", "Sodium Guidebook", "Trans-fat Guidebook" was "intermediate" or "difficult" level (p < 0.05). Readability score was especially low when the contents of some particular subjects were too professionalized or scientific terms were frequently used, and thes results were definitely seen in the "Sodium Guidebook" and "Trans-fat Guidebook". With Cloze test score, the readability evaluation will be using as an evaluation tool for the nutrition education materials.

• Journal of the Institute of Electronics and Information Engineers
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• v.50 no.5
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• pp.175-182
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• 2013

This paper proposes a readability enhancement filter for Patterned Retarder (PR) display. In general, when some texts in stereoscopic images are shown on PR display, their readability tends to be lowered. In order to overcome this problem, we present a readability enhancement algorithm which consists of readability filtering stage and post-processing stage for specific characters. First, each input stereo image is divided into an odd line image and an even line image. Then, they are independently up-scaled vertically by using Lanczos filter. Next, two up-scaled line images are averaged considering vertical phase difference. In post-processing stage, two specific characters which are normally difficult to read on PR display are detected, and they are filtered for additional readability enhancement. Here, this additional filtering is based on a specific brightness adjustment, and is applied only for two characters. The experiment results show that the proposed method achieves significant improvement in terms of readability in comparison with the previous scheme.

• Korean Journal of Environment and Ecology
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.473-481
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• 2006

Readability, an indicator measuring the easiness of reading letters, has been known an important element that determines the communicative effectiveness of the self-guided interpretive signs. However, there are few studies to find out how the readability of the signs influence visitor's attraction and reading behavior of interpretive signs. This study examined the relationship between readability of interpretive signs and attraction, preferences, and intent to recommend reading signs to others. Data were collected from August to November of 2003 at a self-guided trail of Naejangsan National Park, Korea. 350 out of 375 responses from subjects who participated in the questionnaire survey were usable. Results showed that readability of the signs is related with the attraction, preferences, and intention of recommending reading signs to others. The higher the readability of the signs were, the higher the attraction, preferences, and intention of recommending reading signs were. Attraction and preferences were also positively related with intention of recommending reading signs. Preferences better explained intention of recommending reading signs than readability and attraction. These findings suggest that enhancing readability of the signs may lead to higher participation in reading them.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.17 no.12
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• pp.5237-5242
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• 2016

Background: Cancer screening rates are lower in Japan than those in western countries. Health professionals publish procancer screening messages on the internet to encourage audiences to undergo cancer screening. However, the information provided is often difficult to read for lay persons. Further, anti-cancer screening activists warn against cancer screening with messages on the Internet. We aimed to assess and compare the readability of pro- and anti-cancer screening online messages in Japan using a measure of readability. Methods: We conducted web searches at the beginning of September 2016 using two major Japanese search engines (Google.jp and Yahoo!.jp). The included websites were classified as "anti", "pro", or "neutral" depending on the claims, and "health professional" or "non-health professional" depending on the writers. Readability was determined using a validated measure of Japanese readability. Statistical analysis was conducted using two-way ANOVA. Results: In the total 159 websites analyzed, anti-cancer screening online messages were generally easier to read than pro-cancer screening online messages, Messages written by health professionals were more difficult to read than those written by non-health professionals. Claim ${\times}$ writer interaction was not significant. Conclusion: When health professionals prepare pro-cancer screening materials for publication online, we recommend they check for readability using readability assessment tools and improve text for easy comprehension when necessary.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.192-199
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• 2024

Background: Safety data sheets (SDSs) are hazard communication materials that accompany chemicals/hazardous products in the workplace. Many SDSs contain dense, technical text, which places considerable comprehension demands on workers, especially those with lower literacy skills. The goal of this study was to assess SDSs for readability, comprehensibility, and suitability (i.e., fit to the target audience). Methods: The Suitability Assessment of Materials (SAM) tool assessed SDSs for suitability and readability. We then amended the SAM tool to further assess SDSs for comprehensibility factors. Both the original and amended SAM tool were used to score 45 randomly selected SDSs for content, literacy demand, graphics, and layout/typography. Results: SDSs performed poorly in terms of readability, suitability, and comprehensibility. The mean readability scores were Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level (9.6), Gunning Fog index (11.0), Coleman-Liau index (13.7), and Simple Measure of Gobbledygook index (10.7), all above the recommended reading level. The original SAM graded SDSs as "not suitable" for suitability and readability. When the amended SAM was used, the mean total SAM score increased, but the SDSs were still considered "not suitable" when adding comprehensibility considerations. The amended SAM tool better identified content-related issues specific to SDSs that make it difficult for a reader to understand the material. Conclusions: In terms of readability, comprehensibility, and suitability, SDSs perform poorly in their primary role as a hazard communication tool, therefore, putting workers at risk. The amended SAM tool could be used when writing SDSs to ensure that the information is more easily understandable for all audiences.

• Journal of the Korean Society for information Management
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• v.22 no.3 s.57
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• pp.213-232
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• 2005

The purpose of this study is to determine factors affecting text difficulty and to model objective formulas which measure readability scores. Some readability-related factors such as total number of letters, total number of syllables, total number of unique syllables, total number of sentences and total number of paragraphs were found through correlation analysis. Some regression equations with these factors as their variables were produced through regression analysis. A model estimating readability score from total number of unique syllables was a good formula, while a model with two factors, total number of unique syllables and new syllable occurrence ratio, was a better enhanced one. The readability score represents detailed level so we can recommend students read texts corresponding to their reading levels.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.1-24
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• 2012

It has long been shown that Korean EFL students have not practiced extensive reading in school curriculum. Their vocabulary knowledge is limited and a tool for measuring text readability for them has hardly been developed and used. The study aimed to check the current situations on the above issues and develop a reading framework appropriate for extensive reading within the national English curriculum, including the Readability Formula in Korean EFL contexts (KRF). The study consists of four steps. The study does a survey to check the current Korean EFL situations on the issues, suggests a new vocabulary learning size, develops a readability formula as a tool for measuring text difficulty based on the newly suggested vocabulary size, and finally validates the formula with various kinds of English books, including the primary and secondary school English textbooks. It is expected that this study will provide a model for the vocabulary size and the readability index for extensive reading in EFL contexts.