Abstract
Purpose:
To investigate some measurement properties of Dutch reading charts.
Methods:
71 participants (mean age: 55 +/- 19.7 years) with normal vision read 5 reading charts available in the Dutch language (“Nederlanders”; LEO; IReST, Radner and Colenbrander). All sentences and texts were printed at the same size and characters and were read out loud and timed with a stopwatch. In order to compare charts, the main outcomes were reading speed in syllables and characters per minute (corrected for reading mistakes) and the mean number of mistakes per character.
Results:
The corrected reading speed in syllables per minute were in ascending order of charts Nederlanders 237/min, Colenbrander 246/min, Leo 269/min, IReST 278/min and Radner 299/min. The corrected reading speed in characters per minute gave the same order of charts Nederlanders 713/min, Colenbrander 814/min, Leo 823/min, IReST 823/min and Radner 923/min. The number of mistakes made in the reading charts per character were in descending order Nederlanders, Colenbrander, IReST, Leo and Radner. A one tailed Pearson correlation of the number of mistakes per character and reading speed per character revealed a significant correlation for the reading charts that are based on longer texts, 0.013 in Nederlanders and 0.008 in IReST. No significant correlation was found in the other three reading charts that are based on separate sentences. The range of mistakes for the three reading charts with the highest reading speeds was significantly lower than that of the Colenbrander and Nederlanders. The reading speeds decreased from younger to older age categories, aged 18-35 years (n=19) , 36-59 years (n=18) and 60-86 years (n=34). This was also true for the number of mistakes that were made.
Conclusions:
Archaic language may have led to more mistakes in the Nederlanders chart. The 5 Dutch reading charts revealed clear differences in reading speed and difficulty (number of mistakes). These findings have consequences for daily practice and for the possibility to compare scientific outcomes. In the near future, we will also study the charts with logarithmic progression of character size in a population of visually impaired participants.
Keywords: 672 reading •
584 low vision •
468 clinical research methodology