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Readability Stats & Flesch-Kincaid Formulae
When computing readability stats, Word helpfully gives the Average Sentence
Length as well as the Flesch Reading Ease and Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level. If one inverts the formulae (as stated in the help file) one can recover the Average Syllables per Word, which occurs in both formulae - but the two formulae give different answers. One can however get a close match by using instead of 15.59 a value of 15.9 - as occurs in other versions of the formulae on the web (a value of 15.96536 gives full agreement, but 15.9-15.59 could have been a simple typo lost in the mists of time) Question: what does Word ACTUALLY use; how can the inconsistency otherwise be accounted for? What is the CORRECT value? Anyone know? |
#2
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Readability Stats & Flesch-Kincaid Formulae
Hi Julian
I don't think Microsoft has documented how these formulae are designed to work. Hope this helps. Shauna Kelly. Microsoft MVP. http://www.shaunakelly.com/word "Julian" wrote in message ... When computing readability stats, Word helpfully gives the Average Sentence Length as well as the Flesch Reading Ease and Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level. If one inverts the formulae (as stated in the help file) one can recover the Average Syllables per Word, which occurs in both formulae - but the two formulae give different answers. One can however get a close match by using instead of 15.59 a value of 15.9 - as occurs in other versions of the formulae on the web (a value of 15.96536 gives full agreement, but 15.9-15.59 could have been a simple typo lost in the mists of time) Question: what does Word ACTUALLY use; how can the inconsistency otherwise be accounted for? What is the CORRECT value? Anyone know? |
#3
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Readability Stats & Flesch-Kincaid Formulae
Thanks for the comment Shauna -
My point is that the formulae are explicit in the help file - their application should be trivial once one has determined ASL & ASW - but the formulae don't agree with the results given. I was hoping that someone might say "The Help File formula for X" is indeed wrong, but the score is right (or vice versa), i.e. the Help File writer and the coder used two different sources. Looks like a mystery that will never be cleared up! Julian "Shauna Kelly" wrote: Hi Julian I don't think Microsoft has documented how these formulae are designed to work. Hope this helps. Shauna Kelly. Microsoft MVP. http://www.shaunakelly.com/word "Julian" wrote in message ... When computing readability stats, Word helpfully gives the Average Sentence Length as well as the Flesch Reading Ease and Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level. If one inverts the formulae (as stated in the help file) one can recover the Average Syllables per Word, which occurs in both formulae - but the two formulae give different answers. One can however get a close match by using instead of 15.59 a value of 15.9 - as occurs in other versions of the formulae on the web (a value of 15.96536 gives full agreement, but 15.9-15.59 could have been a simple typo lost in the mists of time) Question: what does Word ACTUALLY use; how can the inconsistency otherwise be accounted for? What is the CORRECT value? Anyone know? |
#4
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Readability Stats & Flesch-Kincaid Formulae
The only people who could tell you with certainty are Microsoft
employees with access to the program code, but none of them (to my knowledge) ever read the newsgroups. -- Regards, Jay Freedman Microsoft Word MVP FAQ: http://word.mvps.org Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so all may benefit. On Sun, 5 Aug 2007 17:22:05 -0700, Julian wrote: Thanks for the comment Shauna - My point is that the formulae are explicit in the help file - their application should be trivial once one has determined ASL & ASW - but the formulae don't agree with the results given. I was hoping that someone might say "The Help File formula for X" is indeed wrong, but the score is right (or vice versa), i.e. the Help File writer and the coder used two different sources. Looks like a mystery that will never be cleared up! Julian "Shauna Kelly" wrote: Hi Julian I don't think Microsoft has documented how these formulae are designed to work. Hope this helps. Shauna Kelly. Microsoft MVP. http://www.shaunakelly.com/word "Julian" wrote in message ... When computing readability stats, Word helpfully gives the Average Sentence Length as well as the Flesch Reading Ease and Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level. If one inverts the formulae (as stated in the help file) one can recover the Average Syllables per Word, which occurs in both formulae - but the two formulae give different answers. One can however get a close match by using instead of 15.59 a value of 15.9 - as occurs in other versions of the formulae on the web (a value of 15.96536 gives full agreement, but 15.9-15.59 could have been a simple typo lost in the mists of time) Question: what does Word ACTUALLY use; how can the inconsistency otherwise be accounted for? What is the CORRECT value? Anyone know? |
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