Page 656 - Encyclopedia of Business and Finance

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READING SKILLS IN from ten businesses were analyzed for reading level using
BUSINESS the FORCAST formula. The FORCAST formula devel-
oped in 1975 by Caylor, Sticht, Fox, and Ford uses the
In the business world, workers use special skills to com-
percentage of one-syllable words as the basis for determin-
plete their reading tasks. Traditionally, however, business ing reading level, so it eliminates consideration of recur-
educators have relied on others to develop the job-related
ring technical terms, which can artificially raise the
reading skills of their students. In 1975, Sticht noted that
reading level of technical materials.
the overwhelming majority of time in schools is allocated
to teaching the reading and interpreting of novels, short The average reading grade levels for the documents
ranged from 11.3 for those collected from a bank to 13.4
stories, dramas, and poetry as opposed to teaching techni-
for those collected from a university continuing education
cal reading skills needed in the workplace. The SCANS
(Secretary’s Commission on Achieving Necessary Skills) center office. Other businesses that provided documents
report released in 1991 included the reading of technical and their average reading grade levels included a space
material as a foundation skill needed by all workers. industry manufacturer, 11.4; a town administration
Workplace reading includes the ability to understand and office, 11.8; a hospital, 12; an insurance company, 12; a
interpret various documents including diagrams, directo- chemical industry manufacturer, 12.1; a railroad, 12.8; a
ries, correspondence, manuals, records, charts, graphs, country administration office, 13.1; and a school division
tables, and specifications. office, 13.1. Thus, the reading grade level of typical office
In the 1970s, two researchers, Ross and Salzman, documents is considerably higher than general interest
studied the reading tasks of randomly selected office reading materials. Further, most reading done by adults is
workers in the Columbus, Ohio, area. Ross completed technical, job-related reading and not the type of reading
one-hour observations of one hundred beginning office emphasized in schools.
workers, and Salzman collected 2,659 samples of reading, Based on a study of two groups of high school stu-
writing, and mathematical activities from thirty-five dents in which one group was enrolled in courses required
beginning and thirty-five experienced office workers. to complete a business program and the other group
Outcomes of these two studies identified three unique enrolled in selected elective business courses, Schmidt
reading skills office workers use: proofreading, verifying, reported in 1982 that the first group, composed of 279
and comprehending detail. students, performed better on a proofreading skills test
Building on the research that Ross and Salzman com- than the second group, comprising 1,058 students. How-
pleted, Schmidt reported, in 1987, the reading levels of ever, on tests measuring the skills of verifying and compre-
office documents collected for the purpose of developing hending detail, the first group did not score better than
reading materials aimed at building technical reading the second group. The tests were constructed from actual
skills. One hundred and twenty-one documents collected business documents. From this outcome, Schmidt con-

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