Advertising: Readability “Readability Levels of Magazine Ads,” by F. K.

Shuptrine and D. D. McVicker, is an article in the Journal of Advertising Research. (For more information, visit the Brase/Brase statistics site at http://www.cengagebrain.com and fi nd the link to DASL, the Carnegie Mellon University Data and Story Library. Look in Data Subjects under Consumer and then Magazine Ads Readability fi le.) The following is a list of the number of three-syllable (or longer) words in advertising copy of randomly selected magazine advertisements.

34 21 37 31 10 24 39 10 17 18 32 17 3 10 6 5 6 6 13 22 25 3 5 2 9 3 0 4 29 26 5 5 24 15 3 8 16 9 10 3 12 10 10 10 11 12 13 1 9 43 13 14 32 24 15 Use eight classes.