{"id":38017,"date":"2018-05-01T09:00:17","date_gmt":"2018-05-01T14:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu\/nll\/?p=38017"},"modified":"2018-05-01T17:29:40","modified_gmt":"2018-05-01T22:29:40","slug":"an-inconclusive-psycholinguistic-take-on-post-period-spacing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu\/nll\/?p=38017","title":{"rendered":"An inconclusive psycholinguistic take on post-period spacing"},"content":{"rendered":"

A while back, I peeved<\/a> about the people for whom public devotion to single-spacing after a period is a form of virtue-signaling. I\u2019ve now learned that the one-space-or-two issue has found its way into the journal Attention, Perception, and Psychophysics, which has posted \u201cAre two spaces better than one? The effect of spacing following periods and commas during reading<\/a>\u201d ($) by Rebecca Johnson, Becky Bui, and Lindsay Schmitt.<\/p>\n

The paper came to my attention via Matthew Butterick, the author of Typography for Lawyers<\/em><\/a> and the free, online-only Butterick\u2019s Practical Typography<\/em><\/a> (\"Are two spaces better than one? A response to new research<\/a>\"). He writes:<\/p>\n

Ap\u00adpar\u00adently de\u00adfy\u00ading Bet\u00adteridge\u2019s Law,<\/a> the study claims to show that two spaces af\u00adter a pe\u00adriod are eas\u00adier to read than one. On its face, this also seems to con\u00adtra\u00addict my long\u00adstand\u00ading ad\u00advice to put only one space be\u00adtween sen\u00adtences<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Be\u00adcause the study costs $39.95 for a PDF, I\u2019m cer\u00adtain the so\u00adcial-me\u00addia skep\u00adtics rush\u00ading to claim vic\u00adtory<\/a> for two-spac\u00ading have nei\u00adther bought it nor read it. But I did\u00a0both.<\/p>\n

True, the re\u00adsearchers found that putting two spaces af\u00adter a pe\u00adriod de\u00adliv\u00adered a \u201csmall\u201d but \u201csta\u00adtis\u00adti\u00adcally \u2026\u00a0de\u00adtectable\u201d im\u00adprove\u00adment in read\u00ading speed\u2014about 3%\u2014but cu\u00adri\u00adously, only for those read\u00aders who al\u00adready type<\/em> with two spaces. For ha\u00adbit\u00adual one-spac\u00aders, there was no ben\u00ade\u00adfit at\u00a0all.<\/p>\n

Fur\u00adther\u00admore, the re\u00adsearchers only tested sam\u00adples of a mono\u00adspaced font<\/a> on screen \u2026.\u00a0They didn\u2019t test pro\u00adpor\u00adtional fonts, which they ac\u00adknowl\u00adedge are far more com\u00admon. Nor did they test the ef\u00adfect of two-spac\u00ading on the printed page. The au\u00adthors con\u00adcede that any of these test-de\u00adsign choices could\u2019ve af\u00adfected their findings.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/p>\n

On The Verge, Angela Chen agrees with Butterick, as the title of her piece makes clear: \"Please don\u2019t use this study to justify your horrible habit of using two spaces after periods<\/a>.\"<\/p>\n

Butterick also notes that in addition to the issues that are discussed above, the test materials were quadruple<\/strong> spaced. [Update<\/strong>: I'm referring to the line-spacing.] Yikes! I suppose that it's possible that this didn't matter, given that the spacing was the same in all the experimental conditions. But can we be sure of that? Certainly the decision to use such extreme line-spacing wasn't motivated by a desire to replicate typical real-world reading conditions. I suspect that the decision was\u00a0 a compromise necessitated by the fact that the tests included an eye-tracking component (in addition to testing reading times). My guess is that the eye-tracking equipment's resolving-power was insufficient to ensure accuracy if more realistic spacing had been used. If so, this may be an example of looking for your keys under the streetlamp, because that's where there's the most light.<\/p>\n

In any event, Butterick has a few things to say that are directed to the two-spacers, but that the evangelical one-spacers should pay attention to as well:<\/p>\n

I agree with the re\u00adsearchers\u2019 clos\u00ading thought: \u201cwe should prob\u00ada\u00adbly be ar\u00adgu\u00ading pas\u00adsion\u00adately about things that are more important.\u201d<\/p>\n

An ide\u00adal\u00adis\u00adtic thought, but ar\u00adgu\u00ading pas\u00adsion\u00adately about dumb top\u00adics is the web\u2019s rai\u00adson d\u2019\u00eatre.<\/em> In\u00adter\u00adnet ran\u00addos have been try\u00ading to rope me into ar\u00adgu\u00adments about two-spac\u00ading for 10 years. I in\u00addulged them at the out\u00adset. But not for a long\u00a0time.<\/p>\n

Why? Spoiler alert: I really don\u2019t care how many spaces you put be\u00adtween sen\u00adtences<\/strong>. One? Two? Seven? \u03c0\/4? Knock your\u00adself\u00a0out.<\/p>\n

Ty\u00adpog\u00adra\u00adphy is not a sci\u00adence. Like lan\u00adguage it\u00adself, it has some struc\u00adtural and prac\u00adti\u00adcal con\u00adven\u00adtions. If your goal is to per\u00adsuade read\u00aders, it\u2019s wise to be aware of these con\u00adven\u00adtions, be\u00adcause re\u00adly\u00ading on them can help you. Con\u00adversely, de\u00adpart\u00ading from these con\u00adven\u00adtions may have un\u00adin\u00adtended consequences.<\/p>\n

But in the end, it\u2019s up to you. I\u2019ve never held my\u00adself out as the apex tastemaker nor the ty\u00adpog\u00adra\u00adphy po\u00adlice. My project is to ed\u00adu\u00adcate writ\u00aders about these ty\u00adpo\u00adgraphic con\u00adven\u00adtions, be\u00adcause tra\u00addi\u00adtion\u00adally, these con\u00adven\u00adtions aren\u2019t taught along\u00adside writ\u00ading. (Though they should be\u2014in the dig\u00adi\u00adtal age, ty\u00adpo\u00adgraphic skill seems just as es\u00adsen\u00adtial as typ\u00ading skill.)<\/p>\n

To that end, wher\u00adever there\u2019s room for dis\u00adcre\u00adtion and choice, I say so. I want read\u00aders to de\u00advelop their own ty\u00adpo\u00adgraphic judg\u00adment, not merely recre\u00adate mine, cargo-cult style.<\/a> I de\u00adploy my sternest tone only for those ty\u00adpo\u00adgraphic con\u00adven\u00adtions that are im\u00admov\u00adably en\u00adtrenched. In other words: let\u2019s not waste en\u00adergy dis\u00adput\u00ading the indisputable.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why I start this book with one space be\u00adtween sen\u00adtences<\/a>. Not be\u00adcause it mat\u00adters so much vi\u00adsu\u00adally. But rather be\u00adcause the rule is so well set\u00adtled. It\u2019s a lit\u00admus test for ty\u00adpo\u00adgraphic skep\u00adtics: if you can\u2019t ac\u00adcept that pro\u00adfes\u00adsional ty\u00adpog\u00adra\u00adphers al\u00adways use one space be\u00adtween sen\u00adtences, you\u2019ll likely find the other rules a\u00a0bore.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

To bring this post full circle, I'll return to the peeve that referred to at the beginning. Here's Chen once more:<\/p>\n

It\u2019s important to note that, in a deeper way, none of this—not one space or two, not \u201ctabs versus spaces<\/a>,\u201d or the entire Oxford comma debate—really matters. Humans just love to become overly attached to debates that hold relatively little significance.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But now that I look at that quote more closely, I see that at the beginning of the first sentence, right after \"It's important to note that\", she put a comma, which isn't needed, and that's something that always bugs me.<\/p>\n

If you'll excuse me, I feel a tweetstorm coming on.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A while back, I peeved about the people for whom public devotion to single-spacing after a period is a form of virtue-signaling. I\u2019ve now learned that the one-space-or-two issue has found its way into the journal Attention, Perception, and Psychophysics, which has posted \u201cAre two spaces better than one? The effect of spacing following periods […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[253,182],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38017","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-psycholinguistics","category-typography"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu\/nll\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38017","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu\/nll\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu\/nll\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu\/nll\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/42"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu\/nll\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=38017"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu\/nll\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38017\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38043,"href":"https:\/\/languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu\/nll\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38017\/revisions\/38043"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu\/nll\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=38017"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu\/nll\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=38017"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu\/nll\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=38017"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}