’Numbered headings work best with parallel structured documents that spans an entire document set. (Purdue Online Writing Lab (2010) mentions this organisational benefit too.) ‘In general, it's much harder to write documentation whose structure is completely self-explanatory without some help from a multi-level numbering scheme.’ Formal numbering ‘imposes a discipline on the writer to organize the material in a logical way’ and makes editing easier (White, cited in Anthony, 1996). Some readers are accustomed to it ‘where the numbering scheme is so well-defined and universal for a specific subject that everyone has long since memorized the numbering scheme’ (Hart, cited in Joseph, 2001a).Curious, I looked up two engineering documents. Woolever (2008), author of Writing for the Technical Professions, discusses numbering for ‘technical reports, especially engineering reports’ (p. Us techies tend to like numbers!’ (Robertson, cited in Anthony, 1996) Most of the documents I come across have section numbers. ‘By training/education (PhD Chemistry) and experience I'm a technical person. ‘Technical’ readers like it: ‘Many technical people are used to this format and really prefer it … because it's easier to refer to the sections in the document.’ (Beilby, cited in Joseph, 2001b).Non-native speakers find it easier because ‘numbered headings give them an additional "road sign"’ (Beilby, cited in Joseph, 2001b).Similarly when navigating from a table of contents (Reng, cited in Joseph, 2001b). ‘When I jump from one topic to another and want to go back I have more problems to find the previous heading when I don't have numbers’. And numbering long, complex documents ‘ an indication of where you are in the section and where you are in the document’ (Posada, cited in Joseph, 2001b). ‘Usually the headings don't differ that much in size or style that I could tell at once which heading level that is’ (Reng, cited in Joseph, 2001b). Cross-referencing is easier ‘than saying 3 paragraphs previous’ (Wiley, cited in Anthony, 1996).See what you think of the arguments for and against numbering, and read an expert’s current opinion. For one thing, ‘real users’ still print, as Meredith Evans reminded us at this year’s conference. Although that was in 19, when formatting was more basic and we used print more than screens, some opinions still apply. Numbering has been discussed several times on the TechWhirl forum, with at least two dozen users chiming in on two occasions. In contrast, not only were the plain headings not numbered, their left-alignment meant they lacked hierarchical cues (Klusewitz & Lorch, 2000, p. Numbered headingsįigure 2: The numbered headings used indentation to indicate hierarchy. Plus, numbering wasn’t the only difference between the two conditions indentation was different too. The researchers weren’t examining numbering per se, but headings generally, and the researchers admit the search task was ‘very rudimentary’ (p. It’s best not to read too much into these findings, though. The experiment, which used print notebooks, showed little evidence that headings or cues on hierarchy affected search strategies. Klusewitz and Lorch (2000) examined four types of headings in a text-search study, including structure (numbered) and topic (plain) headings (see figure 2). But there doesn’t seem to be any recent research specifically about numbering. There are theories and models, such as how headings ‘may communicate information… with lettering and/or numbering of text sections’ (Lemarié, Lorch, & Péry-Woodley, 2012, p. Is it good or bad? Let’s look at research, technical communicators’ opinions, and expert advice. Numbering is used in legislation, council bylaws, reference documents, and some journal articles. Here’s an example from the Health and Safety at Work Act (2015):įigure 1: An example of numbering in health and safety legislation. ‘Numbering’ could also use letters or roman numerals. What’s outline numbering? I took it to mean a numbered hierarchy of headings and possibly paragraphs. Her exact words need to be censored but trust me, she wasn’t a supporter! Who would’ve thought that outline numbering could make for lively debate? I certainly didn’t, but it turns out that lots of people have a view on it. If you have a question for Earnsy to tackle, please email In this post, Earnsy looks deeper into the debate around outline numbering. What's the evidence for outline numbering?Įarnsy Liu, TechCommNZ member and GDID student, looks for evidence (not just opinions) to help you manage the daily conundrums we face in our profession.
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