Writing for the reader

This branch holds the decisions that start from the reader, and a reader chooses here by which part of reaching the reader the decision is about: who the reader is and what the document is for, what the reader can read and the plain language and testing that meet it, the storyteller's means of holding a reader, the instruction a reader acts on and the standard operating procedure written from such instructions, a risk put so a reader can weigh it, the page, or making a document usable by a reader with a disability. The wording of the text itself is left to language and style, the picture and the spoken message to visual and spoken communication, writing about health disparities to equity and bias, documents written for a general readership to writing for the public, documents for patients and trial participants to documents for patients and trial participants, the doubt, distrust and misinformation a message has to get past to trust, hesitancy and misinformation, involving patients in the work to patient partnerships in research and communication, and the arithmetic of a risk to risk and treatment effects.

• Audience and purpose — defining the purpose and describing the readers: level and register, the distance between writer and reader, moving a reader to act, and particular readers such as patients, regulators and assessors, and readers who can leave
• Plain language and health literacy — what health literacy is, the size and cost of the shortfall and how a reader with limited skills reads, plain language: what it is, who needs it most, and how it is planned, worded, learned and made an organisation's practice, and the guides, toolkits and training for both
• Readability and testing with readers — readability formulas and what a score can tell you, what lowering a reading grade level costs in text cohesion, and testing with real readers
• Narrative technique in factual writing — the decisions storytellers make, applied to factual writing: concrete wording and where creativity stops, the lede, the hook and the ending, pace, characters and patient voices, emotion that earns the reading, and telling science as a story
• Clear instructions — stating the action, who acts and in what sequence, separating instructions from explanation, and testing what readers understand
• Standard operating procedures — writing a procedure the people doing a task can follow, putting it into use and keeping it current, aligning two groups' procedures, and why one followed to the letter can still miss its purpose
• Communicating risk and uncertainty — putting a risk beside the risk it is weighed against, what makes a risk frightening, framing, formats readers understand, and building trust before it is needed
• Readable layout — arranging a page or a screen for its reader: why layout is the writer's job, typography, grouping and the Gestalt principles, emphasis, headings and lists, page conventions and genre, results and references, and pages read on a screen
• Accessibility for readers with disabilities — making a document, a web page or a post usable by readers with a disability: accessible electronic documents, accessible web and social media content, and printed layouts for readers who cannot use every cue