Using eye tracking methodology, we investigate correlations between traditional readability indicators and controlled language (CL) rules applied to texts from the information technology domain. We evaluate the perceived readability and recall levels of the texts as well as the readability and acceptability of the texts when machine-translated into French, Spanish, and Simplified Chinese. Task time, fixation count, and fixation duration measures suggest that CL rules facilitate a marginal improvement in readability levels for texts rated as “difficult to read” by the readability indicators. We conclude that the relationship between controlled language and readability is complex and make discrete suggestions for factors that should be taken into account for future research, including text complexity, text presentation, and working memory capacity.
2021. Towards an ergonomic linguistics: Application to the design of controlled natural languages. International Journal of Applied Linguistics 31:1 ► pp. 18 ff.
Doherty, Stephen & Sharon O'Brien
2014. Assessing the Usability of Raw Machine Translated Output: A User-Centered Study Using Eye Tracking. International Journal of Human-Computer Interaction 30:1 ► pp. 40 ff.
Huang, Xie’an & Hong Xu
2023. Rei Miyata: controlled document authoring in a machine translation age. Language Resources and Evaluation 57:3 ► pp. 1423 ff.
Miyata, Rei, Anthony Hartley, Kyo Kageura & Cécile Paris
2015. ‘Garbage Let’s Take Away’: Producing Understandable and Translatable Government Documents: A Case Study from Japan. In Social Media for Government Services, ► pp. 367 ff.
2019. Helping the helpers: Evaluating the impact of a controlled language checker on the intralingual and interlingual translation tasks involving volunteer health professionals. Translation Studies 12:2 ► pp. 253 ff.
Shih, Claire Y.
2023. Navigating the Web,
Sun, Sanjun
2019. Measuring Difficulty in Translation and Post-editing: A Review. In Researching Cognitive Processes of Translation [New Frontiers in Translation Studies, ], ► pp. 139 ff.
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