Text readability and intuitive simplification: A comparison of readability formulas

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bitstream:

http://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu/bitstream/10125/66657/1/23_1_10125_66657_crossley.pdf

bitstream_txt:

http://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu/bitstream/10125/66657/2/23_1_10125_66657_crossley.pdf.txt

collection:

Volume 23, No. 1

contributor.author:

Crossley, Scott A. Allen, David B. McNamara, Danielle S.

date.accessioned:

2020-05-22T02:12:50Z

date.available:

2020-05-22T02:12:50Z

date.issued:

2011-04

description.abstract:

Texts are routinely simplified for language learners with authors relying on a variety of approaches and materials to assist them in making the texts more comprehensible. Readability measures are one such tool that authors can use when evaluating text comprehensibility. This study compares the Coh-Metrix Second Language (L2) Reading Index, a readability formula based on psycholinguistic and cognitive models of reading, to traditional readability formulas on a large corpus of texts intuitively simplified for language learners. The goal of this study is to determine which formula best classifies text level (advanced, intermediate, beginner) with the prediction that text classification relates to the formulas’ capacity to measure text comprehensibility. The results demonstrate that the Coh-Metrix L2 Reading Index performs significantly better than traditional readability formulas, suggesting that the variables used in this index are more closely aligned to the intuitive text processing employed by authors when simplifying texts.

description.provenance:

Made available in DSpace on 2020-05-22T02:12:50Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 23_1_10125_66657_crossley.pdf: 240994 bytes, checksum: 2024eb89e9b5d934bad5f7929c8f635f (MD5) Previous issue date: 2011-04

endingpage:

101

identifier.doi:

10125/66657

identifier.issn:

1539-0578

identifier.uri:

http://hdl.handle.net/10125/66657

number:

1

publisher:

University of Hawaii National Foreign Language Resource Center Center for Language & Technology

rfl.topic:

Text Analysis

site_url:

/rfl/item/237

startingpage:

86

subject:

readability Coh-Metrix L2 Reading Index simplification psycholinguistics cognitive science computational linguistics corpus linguistics

title:

Text readability and intuitive simplification: A comparison of readability formulas

type:

Article

type.dcmi:

Text

volume:

23