Will your readers read all of your copy? Insights from the psychology of language

One of the key questions we ask when testing copy is where readers stop reading or skip over text – something most readers do much of the time.

Some insights from the psychology of language explain why readers stop reading or skip.

1. Neuroscience: the brain predicts what is coming ahead

Because of the way our brains work – basically as prediction machines – when readers read, they continuously predict what comes next in the text, fine-tuning their predictions as they go. They keep going if the copy provides them with the information they need. They stop or skip when they think they won’t get value from reading the next bit. They decide this before reading.

• TIP. Readers who anticipate that some upcoming text will not be useful to them right now will skip over it. If such copy appears early on, readers may skip the whole piece altogether. Readers are busy. Tell them what they need right now. Don’t fluff, especially at the beginning.

2. Social psychology: give your readers a sense of self-worth

Readers may feel intimidated by dense copy or multisyllabic, unfamiliar words. Intimidated readers skip over that kind of text. They simply don’t read it.

Readers who feel patronised or made to feel small will also disengage from your copy.

• TIP: Understanding readers’ emotional reactions to your copy is one of the most powerful reasons why you should test it

3. Cognitive psychology – don’t overload your reader

Cognitive overload happens when the information in front of you is too much for your brain to hold at one time. . When copy cause cognitive overload, readers get confused, miss key points, and leave. You can overload your readers by:

• Telling readers too many things at once
• Using jargon
• Poor formatting and layout. and
• Leaving readers to guess what they should do next

4. Gestalt psychology: readers use visual signals to decide what’s worth reading

Readers use heuristics to predict where key information will be – and sometimes they are wrong. Gestalt psychology helps us to understand the kinds of assumptions that readers make because of how the copy looks. For example

• Proximity: Similar looking paragraphs placed close together will be assumed to be similar in content. Therefore, readers may skip over paragraph 2 because it looks just like paragraph 1.
• Figure/Ground: Our minds instinctively isolate prominent objects from their surrounding background. Copy that has a lot of white space – because it uses short paragraphs or short lists, for example – helps the reader identify key points more easily.
• Closure: Our brains like closure, so readers are often looking to see when they can stop reading. For example, if you leave a lot of white space at the bottom of a 2-page document, many readers will stop reading at the bottom of page 1.

We can test your copy

We have been testing copy of all kinds for the last 25 years.

You can trust your content with us. We are members of the Research Society and are therefore bound by the Code of Professional Behaviour that protects the privacy of your members and the confidentiality of your information. We are also accredited to the ISO 20252 standard for both qualitative and quantitative research and as such have strict data protection and information security protocols in place.

To find out more. contact Sue.