Readability Analysis - Wardley Map Library

🚨 Most Common Readability Issues

💡 Quick Improvement Tips:

Shorten sentences: Aim for 12-18 words per sentence
Simplify vocabulary: Replace complex words with simpler alternatives
Add structure: Use more headers, bullet points, and examples
Use active voice: Avoid passive constructions

📂 Readability by Category

📚 Book Rankings

🎯 Target Readability Scores

Based on analysis of 182 books and content type considerations for strategic business documentation:

Overall Composite Score
Current: 16.6 → Target: 50-70
Weighted average of all metrics for overall readability

Flesch Reading Ease
Current: 0.5 → Target: 60-70
Standard level for general audiences (13th-15th grade education)

Grade Level Metrics
Current: 22+ years → Target: 12-16 years
High school to college level (F-K, Fog, SMOG, ARI, CLI)

Sentence Length
Current: 17.1 words → Target: 12-18 words
Already within acceptable range (near optimal)

🎯 Strategy Priority: Focus on reducing grade level complexity from graduate/professional level (22+ years) to high school/college level (12-16 years) while maintaining technical accuracy. The current sentence length is already within target range.

🛠️ Readability Improvement Guide

Based on analysis of 182 books, here are the most critical improvements needed:

📏 Sentence Structure Issues:

Current average: 17.1 words per sentence
Target: 12-18 words per sentence ✓ (Already achieved)
Action: Maintain current sentence length; focus on other metrics

🔤 Vocabulary Complexity (Priority #1):

Current average: 2.2+ syllables per word
Target: 1.3-1.7 syllables per word
Action: Replace technical jargon with plain language alternatives

🎓 Grade Level Reduction (Priority #2):

Current average: 22+ years education required
Target: 12-16 years (high school to college level)
Action: Simplify complex sentences and reduce academic language

🏗️ Structure Problems:

63% of books lack sufficient headers
Target: 1 header per 200-400 words
Action: Add more subheadings and bullet points

🔬 Research Context & Methodology

Our readability analysis uses 6 classic readability formulas from the 1940s-1970s era, covering traditional linguistic assessment methods.

📚 Classic Formulas (Our Implementation):

Flesch Reading Ease (1948)
0-100 scale based on sentence length and syllables

Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level (1975)
U.S. grade level estimation

Gunning Fog Index (1952)
Education years needed for comprehension

SMOG Index (1969)
Simple Measure of Gobbledygook

Automated Readability Index (1967)
Character-based metric for real-time scoring

Coleman-Liau Index (1975)
Alternative character-based assessment

🤖 Modern Approaches (Research Reference):

Neural LM Readability (2019-2021)
Transformer perplexity, BERT classifiers
+ Higher accuracy, semantic understanding
- Computationally expensive, less interpretable

ETS TextEvaluator (2013)
43 linguistic features, syntax analysis
+ Rich feature set, teacher-aligned
- Proprietary, complex implementation

CommonLit CLEAR ML (2021)
Ensemble ML with transformer embeddings
+ Open dataset, competition benchmarks
- Requires large training data

📖 Why Classic Formulas?

Proven Reliability: 50+ years of validation across domains
Fast Processing: Real-time analysis of large text collections
Interpretable Results: Clear understanding of score components
Language Agnostic: Work across different languages and domains
Standard Benchmarks: Comparable with educational and publishing standards
Low Computational Cost: Suitable for large-scale analysis

📊 Research Coverage: Our implementation covers 6 of 7 major classic formulas (missing Dale-Chall which requires 3,000-word familiar word lists). See research/readabiliity_methods.md for detailed comparison with modern approaches.

📖 Readability Analysis Report