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Subject:Re: Font and Case for best readability on a Form? From:Holly Turner <hturner -at- HARBINGER -dot- COM> Date:Fri, 19 Sep 1997 10:07:13 -0400
Hi. I'm the person that initiated the "ragged right" discussion. The
same book I quoted before also has studies on case. Here is a quote
from _Type and Layout_ by Colin Wheildon:
...When a person reads a line of type, the eye recognizes letters by the
shape of their upper halves. With lower case, this is simple, because
the top halves of lower case letters are generally distinctive, and,
importantly, framed bythe white space that surrounds them, permitting
easy recognition.
Put the headline in capitals, and the eye is presented with a solid
rectangle, and recognizing the words becomes a task instead of a natural
process.
He goes on to explain a study he did on this topic. The study found
that headlines set in lower case were 20%-30% more legible.
Holly Turner
Technical Writer
Harbinger Corp.
>----------
>From: Hillary Russak[SMTP:hrussak -at- SLAC -dot- STANFORD -dot- EDU]
>Sent: Thursday, September 18, 1997 5:02 PM
>Subject: Font and Case for best readability on a Form?
>
>I'm hoping this is less subjective than "ragged right". Can you-all lend
>me your learning on preferred choice of font and mixed-case or caps for
>text on a form?
>
>I kinda feel like an idiot in this... I asked one of my authors to change
>the mixed-case portion of her form to all-caps, based on my impression that
>the all-caps version on the "instructions" page was more readable. Enter
>another author, claiming the all-caps was hard to read and had a
>questionable retention level...
>
>What say you experts?
>-hil
>
>Hillary M. Russak, Technical Writer
>Stanford Linear Accelerator Center
>ES&H Division, Waste Management Department
>hrussak -at- slac -dot- stanford -dot- edu
>Office: (650) 926-3193
>Pager: (650) 940-0741
>
>
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