DOCUMENT RESUME ED 130 242 CS 002 987 AUTHOR Sticht, Thomas G., Ed.; Zapf, Diana Welty,Ed. TITLE Reading and Readability Research in the Armed Services. Final Report. INSTITUTION Human Resources Research Organization, Alexandria, Va. SPONS AGENCY Air Force Office of Scientific Research, Arlington, Va.; Army Research Inst. for the Behavioral and Social Sciences, Arlington, Va.; Navy Personnel Research and Development Center, San Diego, Calif.; Office of Naval Research, Washington, D.C.Personnel and Training Branch. REPORT NO HumPRO-FR-WD-CA-76-4 PUB DATE Sep 76 CONTRACT NO0014-76-C-0312 NOTE 316p. EDRS PRICE MF-$0.83 HC-$16.73 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS *Adult Basic Education; *Armed Forces; *Functional Reading; *Literacy Education; Literature Reviews; *Readability; Reading Research; Research and Development Centers; *Speech Skills; Technical Writing; Textbook Evaluation ABSTRACT The Conference on Reading and Readability Researchin the Armed Services brought together reading, technicalwriting, and readability experts from civilian research anddevelopment(R & D) centers with R & D specialists from the armed servicesfor discussion of reading and-text-design problems in the military.This report of the proceedings includes perspectivepapers prepared by research workers representing the air force,army, and navy; the comments and suggestions made by the civilian consultants;and recommenaations for future R & D in the services. Major recommendationsstressed the need for each service branch to developa comprehencive plan leading toward a total career-development program; the needfor functional, job-related literacy training; the need to consideroral,skills as well as literacy skills; and the need formore basic research. (Author/AA) *********************************************************************** Documents acquired by ERIC include many informal unpublished * materials not available from othersources. ERIC makes every effort * * to obtain the best copy available. Nevertheless,items of marginal * * reproducibility are often encountered and this affectsthe quality * * of the microfiche and hardcopy reproductionsERIC makes available * via the ERIC Document Reproduction Service (EDRS) . EDRS is not * responsible for the quality of the original document.Reproductions * * supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from theoriginal. *********************************************************************** U S DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH EDUCATION WELFARE NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF EDUCATION THIS DOCUMENT HAS BEEN REPRO. DUCED EXACTLY AS RECF,.5-DI. ROM THE PERSON OR ORGANIZATION ORIGIN. nal Report ATING IT POINTS OF VIE4 OR OPNIONS STATED DO NOT NECECSARIL V REPRE- SENT OFFICIAL NATIONAL INST.TuTE OF HumRRO EDUCATION POSITION OR POL.( Y HumRRO R-WD-CA-76-4 Reading and Readability Research in the Armed Services Thomas G. Sticht and Diana Welty Zapf 16; Editors 1 HUMAN RESOURCES RESEARCH ORGANIZATION 300 North Washington Street Alexandria, Virginia 22314 otember 1976 Prepared for: 'N Air Force Office of Scientific Research (k) Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences Navy Personnel Research and Lavelopment Center Office of Naval Research 2 Approved for public release, distribution unlimited. UNCTASSTPTRn SECURITY CLASSIFICATION OF THIS PAGE (WhenData Entered) READ INSTRUCTIONS I REPORT DOCUMENTATION PAGE BEFORE COMPLETING FORM 1I. REPOR 7 NUMBER 2. GOVT ACCESSION NO.3. RECIPIENT'S CATALOG NUMBER ! HumRROFR-WD-CA-76-4 t 1 4. TITLE (andSubtitle) S. TYPE OF REPORT tt PERIOD COVERED ,1 Raading and Readability Research i 4 4'1 the Armed Services Final Report i 6. PERFORMING ORG. REPORT NUMBER FR-WD-CA-76-4 i 7.AUTNOR(e) 8. CONTRACT OR GRANT NUMBERN Thomas G. Sticht . Diana Welty Zapf 1 N00014-76-C-0312 p.PERFORMING ORGAN1ZATION2NAME AND ADDRESS 10. PROGRAM ELEMENT, PROJECT, TASK ,-Human Resources Research Organization (HumRRO) AREAaWORK UNIT NUMBERS T i 300 North Washington Street i Alexandria, Virginia 22314 NR 154-385 II. CONTROLLING OFFICE NAME AND ADDRESS 12. REPORT DATE Personnel and Training Research September 1976 Office of Naval Research (Code N00014) 13. NUMBER OF PAGES 800 N. Quincy Street, Arlington VA 22217 328 i4. MONITORINGP.GEncyNAME 8 ADDRESS(lldifferent from Controlling Office) IS. SECURITY CLASS.(of this report) Unclassified 15e. DECLASSIFICATION/DOWNGRADING SCH EDULE 1,3. DISTRIBUTION STATEMENT(of this Report) ' ADT3roved for public release; distribution unlimited. I' i .r 1 ) )17. DISTRIBUT1ON STATEMENT(of the abstract entered in Block 20, If different from Report) 118. SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES I Jointly sponsored.by Air Force Office of Scientific Research, ArmyResearch t , Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences, Navy Personnel Research and 4 Development Center, and Office of Naval Research. 1 Research performed by HumRRO Western Division (CA), under Work UnitREADWRITE4[ 19. KEY WORDS(Continue on reverse side if necessary and Identify by block number) Comprehensibility Literacy Text design ; Education Programmed instruction Useability 1 Functional literacy Readability Writing Information processing Reading 1 4 Job reading . Technical documentation 1 20. ABSTRACT(Continue on reverse side if necesaary and Identify by block number) This report contains the proceedings of the Conferenceon Reading and Readabi- 1 lity Research in the Armed Services, heldon October 28-30, 1975. The iConference brought togetherreading and technical writing/readabilityexperts from civilian R&D centers with R&D specialists and operational personnelwith- in the Armed Services for fecused discussionon reading and readability/text i design.problems in the Services. This report presents the perspective paper,: I prepared by research personnel representing the Air Force, Army, and-,.vy; i the comments and suggestions by the civilian consultants; and recommendations DD 1P.,`,Z7-3 1477 E OPTION OF 1 NOV 6 5 IS OBSOLETE 3 enIIP UNCLASSIFIED )1NrucstiTED SECURITY CLASSIFICATION OF THIS P AGE(,7ten Date Entered) 1 20. (Continued) for future R&D in the Services. The major recommendations stressed , the following needs: (1) Need for each Service to develop a comprehensive plan leading toward a total career development program. (2) Need for functional, job-related literacy training. (3) Need to consider oracy skills as well as literacy skills. (4) Need for more basic research in the areas of reading, read- ability, comprehensibility, and useability. UNCLASSIFIED SDMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS MILITARY PROBLEM Whenever the job or training performance of military personnelis adversely affected by inadequate literacy skills, the ArmedServices face -. a literacy problem. The Services cannot rely upon the nonaccePtanceor limited assignments of marginal literates to avoid this problem. Times of increased mobilizationor lower economic opportunity will bring a certain percentage of marginal literates into the Services,as will considerations of equal opportunity and upward mobility. Furthermore, the increasingly technical nature of militarydocumentation demands high . literacy skill levels; even.personnel of moderate reading ability may fall short of these high levels. The overall "literacy problem," which involves both oral and written language skills (oracy and literacy), has two sides: (1) the personnel side - problems of assessment of the literacy andoracy skills of personnel and of attempts to raise those skills through literacy training; and (2) the materials side.- problems of assessment of the reading difficulty (readability, comprehensibility, useability) of job andtraining materials and of attempts to lower the difficulty of those materials andto other- wise modify job and training requirements to reduce their literacy demands. RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT PROBLEM The Armed Services have active research and development efforts which address both sides of the literacy problem. Considerable R&D activity on this problem also exists outsie.e the military. Increased interaction between Armed Services and civilian R&D personnel would provideopportunity for fresh insight and ideas for future R&D activities within theServices. To meet such an objective, an agreement was made to holda Conference which would bring together key military and civilian personnel in theseR&D areas. APPROACH A Conference on Reading and Readability Research in the Armed Services provided an opportunity for an exchange of ideas between military R&D personnel and civilian consultants. In this interchange, past and present Armed Services R&D efforts, delivered in perspectivepapers, were discussed in Working Group sessions which met to consider recommendations forfuture R&D. Historical papers were delivered by J. Dexter Fletcher (NPRDC), Jack Hiller (ARI), and James R. Burkett (AFHRL). Papers on current research on the Personnel side of the literacy problemwere delivered by Thomas Duffy (NPRDC), John Caylor (HuirRRO), and Steven Groff (AFHRL). Papers on the materials side of the literacy problemwere prepared by Thomas Curran (NPRDC), Arthur Siegel (Applied Psychological Services), .Richard Kern (ARI), Robert Johnson (AFF1RL), and William Muller (NAVAIRSYSCOM). 1 The civilian consultants, who led the Working Group sessions, were Jeanne Chall (Harvard), Samuel Gibbon (Children's Television Workshop), Robert Glaser (LRDC), John Guthrie (IRA), George Klare (Ohio University), Michael Macdonald-Ross (Open University), Ernst Rothkopf (Bell Labs), and Richard Venezky (University of Wisconsin). Macdonald-Ross presented the Conference keynote address, "Research and the Transformer," which gives