The worst readability scores belong to Dave Strohmaier and Diane Smith, but that could change: I have yet to analyze Sam Rankin’s page. If he files, I’ll test his prose. And when Jason Ward, who has filed, opens his website, I’ll check its readability.
Before discussing the numbers, a caveat or two. Readability formulas — Flesch-Kincaid is probably the best known — assume that long sentences, especially long sentences with long words, are harder to read than shorter sentences with shorter words. But readability scores are blind to logic, grammar, word choice, typography, graphic design, and many other things that professional editors consider in forming an opinion on readability.
So why use readability scores? In my experience, they’re a quick way to flag prose complexity that’s incommensurate with the author’s target audience. If you’re writing for eighth-graders, your prose should not generate college level readability scores. If it does, it’s time for some blue-penciling.
Keep that in mind while you examine the following graph, which includes both House candidates’ scores and scores for selected Presidential speeches and several local writers: InterLake editor Frank Miele, Beacon editor Kellyn Brown, and Whitefish Superintendent of Schools Kate Orozco.
I generated my Flesch-Kincaid scores with a cross-platform, open-source application, Flesh. Microsoft Word also generates Flesch-Kincaid scores, but many versions of Word truncate the grade-level at 12 for no good reason. If you’re interested in the Gunning Fog Index and other readability tests, the donationware application Word Counter generates more than 50 statistics. Depending on how these applications are configured, the readability scores will vary slightly.
Candidate |
Grade level |
Reading ease |
Sent- ences |
Words |
Syllables per word |
Words per sentence |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Rob Stutz | 9.2 | 51.9 | 77 | 990 | 1.68 | 12.9 |
Steve Daines | 10.1 | 53.2 | 26 | 441 | 1.61 | 17.0 |
Melinda Gopher | 11.6 | 39.0 | 29 | 455 | 1.80 | 15.7 |
Kim Gillan | 12.4 | 43.6 | 52 | 1,098 | 1.68 | 21.1 |
Franke Wilmer | 12.6 | 37.9 | 74 | 1,392 | 1.77 | 18.8 |
Dave Strohmaier | 13.0 | 41.3 | 84 | 1,855 | 1.69 | 22.1 |
Diane Smith | 14.9 | 33.5 | 30 | 764 | 1.74 | 25.5 |
Obama Inaugural | 8.8 | 65.7 | 126 | 2,375 | 1.44 | 18.9 |
WJC 1st Inaugural | 8.4 | 62.9 | 103 | 1,610 | 1.51 | 15.6 |
JFK Inaugural | 11.4 | 59.1 | 52 | 1,346 | 1.44 | 25.9 |
FDR 1st Inaugural | 10.3 | 54.7 | 101 | 1,884 | 1.57 | 18.7 |
FDR 4th Inaugural | 7.9 | 71.3 | 30 | 550 | 1.38 | 18.3 |
Lincoln 2nd | 7.8 | 68.5 | 40 | 654 | 1.44 | 16.4 |
Frank Miele | 10.3 | 57.4 | 61 | 1,238 | 1.52 | 20.3 |
Kellyn Brown | 11.8 | 50.0 | 28 | 625 | 1.59 | 22.3 |
Kate Orozco | 15.2 | 36.4 | 25 | 709 | 1.67 | 28.4 |
What accounts for the difference between the scores for lawyers Smith and Stutz? Sentence length, primarily. Stutz uses bullet lists — short sentences — to present his positions on issues. Smith does not. She writes discursively. Her sentences are nearly twice as long as Stutz’s.
Another factor leading to dangerously high readability scores for most of Montana’s Democratic candidates for the U.S. House is under-funded campaigns. Big budget campaigns employ top flight advertising agencies with highly skilled writers to produce their websites and write speeches, position papers, press releases, and so forth.
Low budget campaigns, such as those of Stutz, Gillan, et al, seldom have access to writers and copy editors the candidate respects and trusts. Consequently, a lot of what appears on low budget websites is written by the candidates, who are highly educated, high powered people accustomed to writing for their peers, and therefore are susceptible to unwittingly writing over the head of the average voter.
That doesn’t happen with Barack Obama. His inaugural address’ Flesch-Kincaid grade level was 8.8 with a reading ease score of 65.7. According to Slate, most of his speeches are in that range. That’s consistent with the old newsroom rule of writing for the milkman with the eighth grade education.
The milkman I write for graduated from high school. Below, the statistics for the ten paragraphs above, generated by Word Counter.
Name | Value |
---|---|
Words | 486 |
Unique Words | 292 |
Characters | 3122 |
Characters In Words | 2541 |
Sentences | 29 |
Paragraphs | 10 |
Average Word Length | 5.2 |
Average Sentence Length | 87.6 |
Average Words Per Sentence | 16.8 |
Long Words (7 or more characters) | 133 |
Short Words (3 or fewer characters) | 154 |
Syllables | 810 |
Syllables per word | 1.67 |
Monosyllabic Words | 297 |
Polysyllabic Words (3 or more syllables) | 88 |
Automated Readability Index | 11.6 |
Coleman Index | 13.2 |
Coleman-Liau Index | 15.0 |
Dale Chall Readability Index | 9.7 |
Dale Chall Readability Grade Level | 13 - 15 |
Degrees Of Reading Power (DRP) | 72 |
Degrees Of Reading Power Grade Level | Greater than 12 |
Fang Easy Listening Formula | 11 |
Fang Easy Listening Interpretation | Easy |
Farr-Jenkins-Patterson Score | 49 |
Farr-Jenkins-Patterson Reading Ease | Difficult |
Flesch Reading Ease Score | 49 |
Flesch Reading Ease | Difficult |
Flesch Reading Ease Grade Level | 13 to 16 (College) |
Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level | 10.6 |
Flesch-Kincaid Reading Age | 15.6 |
Fry Readability Grade Level | 12 |
Fry Readability Reading Age | 17 |
FORCAST Grade Level | 10.8 |
FORCAST Reading Age | 15.8 |
Gunning Fog Index (FOG) | 13.9 |
Gunning Fog Reading Age | 18.9 |
Henshall formula | 869.4 |
Johnson Readability | 38.9 |
Johnson Grade Level | 8 or higher |
Lexical Density | 60.1 |
Laesbarhedsindex (LIX) Index | 44.0 |
Laesbarhedsindex (LIX) Readability | Standard |
Laesbarhedsindex (LIX) Grade Level | 8 |
Linsear Write Readability | 11.4 |
McAlpine EFLAW© Test | 22.1 |
McAlpine EFLAW© Readability | Quite Easy |
Miyazaki EFL Readability Index | 34.6 |
Power-Sumner-Kearl Grade Level | 6.7 |
Power-Sumner-Kearl Reading Age | 11.7 |
Rate Index (RIX) | 4.6 |
Rate Index (RIX) Grade Level | 10 |
Raygor Readability Grade Level | College |
SMOG Score | 13.1 |
SMOG Index | 13.0 |
SMOG Reading Age | 18.0 |
Spache Readability Index (Original) | 6.1 |
Spache Readability Index (Revised) | 5.5 |
Wheeler Smith Index | 47.2 |
Wheeler Smith Grade Level | Greater than 4 |