EDITORIAL

Keep it simple, stupid!

Published by
Elsevier Ltd.
The Boulevard, Langford Lane,
Kidlington, OX5 1GB, UK
Editorial
Using longer words to appear
Managing Editor Cordelia Sealy
E-mail: c.sealy@elsevier.com
Editor Jonathan Wood
more intelligent actually has
E-mail: j.wood@elsevier.com
Editorial Assistant James Quinney
E-mail: j.quinney@elsevier.com
the opposite effect – a lesson
Senior Production/Design Controller
Lin Lucas
E-mail: materialstoday@elsevier.com
for all of us.
Advertising
Advertisements Manager Kevin Partridge Jonathan Wood | Editor, Materials Today | j.wood@elsevier.com
E-mail: k.partridge@elsevier.com
Advertisement Sales, USA John Lucas
E-mail: j.lucas@elsevier.com
Advertisement Sales, Europe David Kay
E-mail: dkay@fastnet.co.uk “Eschew obfuscation,” said the failing English teacher, Oppenheimer. “Reducing fluency hurts readers’ inferences
Free circulation enquiries explaining to his class how to write better essays. It’s an about the text’s author. In practice, this suggests that
Materials Today, Tower House,
Sovereign Park, Market Harborough old joke, and not a very good one at that, because most of writers should attempt to express themselves as clearly as
LE16 9EF, UK
Tel: +44 (0)1858 439 601 us need to look up a dictionary before we get it. possible.”
Fax: +44 (0)1858 434 958
E-mail: controlled1@subscription.co.uk I was reminded of this story when I came across a paper Complex and specialized vocabulary is often a necessity in
Subscription orders & payments
Price:
169 / US$189 by Daniel M. Oppenheimer of the Department of research where there is need for precision and accuracy.
Europe/ROW Tel: +31 20 485 3757
USA Tel: +1 212 633 3730 Psychology at Princeton University that had this great However, we need to recognize that this creates an
© Elsevier Ltd. 2006 title: ‘Consequences of erudite vernacular utilized exclusive club of those who can follow the language (and
Materials Today is owned and
published by Elsevier Ltd. All material irrespective of necessity: problems with using long words is also why some try to to become a member by overusing
published in Materials Today is
copyright Elsevier Ltd. needlessly’ [Appl. Cognitive Psych. (2006) 20, 139]. complicated terms). Care is needed, especially in
Open access under CC BY-NC-ND license. Oppenheimer reports how he altered a series of excerpts, interdisciplinary areas, that unnecessary jargon doesn’t
This journal and the individual contributions contained
in it are protected under copyright by Elsevier Ltd, and translations, and student essays by changing the become a barrier to entry for those outside the immediate
the following terms and conditions apply to their use:
Photocopying: Single photocopies of single articles may
be made for personal use as allowed by national
complexity of random words. He then asked Stanford specialty. I know from personal experience how language
copyright laws. Permission of the Publisher and payment
of a fee is required for all other photocopying, including students about how easy they found the texts to read and can be the biggest challenge in grasping the world of
multiple or systematic copying, copying for advertising
or promotional purposes, resale, and all forms of
document delivery. Special rates are available for
to rate the author’s intelligence. Perhaps surprisingly, the molecular biology, for example.
educational institutions that wish to make photocopies
more complex the words used, the less intelligent an
for non-profit educational classroom use.
Permissions may be sought directly from Elsevier Global
We try our best to make Materials Today accessible
Rights Department, P.O. Box 800, Oxford OX5 1DX, UK; author appears to the reader. and easy to read, but no doubt we could do more. In his
phone: (+44) 1865 843830, fax: (+44) 1865 853333, e-
mail: permissions@elsevier.com. You may also contact
Global Rights directly through Elsevier’s homepage
(http://www.elsevier.com), by selecting ‘Obtaining
We all know that we should write simply and clearly, but a paper, Oppenheimer quotes studies that have found that
Permissions’.
In the USA, users may clear permissions and make lot of us might secretly admit to adding in the odd, extra- fluency and simpler writing can lead to higher judgements
payments through the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc.,
222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, USA; phone: impressive word in the past to show that we know our of the text’s truth, greater confidence in what is said, and
(+1) (978) 7508400, fax: (+1) (978) 7504744, and in the
UK through the Copyright Licensing Agency Rapid
Clearance Service (CLARCS), 90 Tottenham Court Road,
stuff. If not, I’m sure we’ve all read students’ work or some even liking of the author. So it’s clearly something to
London W1P 0LP, UK; phone: +44 (0)20 7631 5555; fax:
+44 (0)20 7631 5500. Other countries may have a local papers where this has been taken to a painful extreme. strive for!
reprographic rights agency for payments.
Derivative Works: Subscribers may reproduce tables of
contents or prepare lists of articles including abstracts
Apparently, this practice is detrimental to the reader’s
for internal circulation within their institutions.
Permission of the Publisher is required for resale or opinion of the work, regardless of prior expectations of the
distribution outside the institution.
Permission of the Publisher is required for all other text’s quality.
derivative works, including compilations and
translations.
Electronic Storage or Usage: Permission of the Publisher
is required to store or use electronically any material
“The paper investigates the effect of reducing fluency –
contained in this journal, including any article or part of
an article. the feeling of ease or difficulty associated with a mental
Except as outlined above, no part of this publication
may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or task – on judgments of intelligence,” explains
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise,
without prior written permission of the Publisher.
Address permissions requests to: Elsevier Global Rights
Department, at the mail, fax and e-mail addresses noted
above. Editorial Advisory Panel
Notice: No responsibility is assumed by the Publisher for
any injury and/or damage to persons or property as a Gabriel Aeppli Larry Dalton Mark Johnson Richard Spontak
matter of products liability, negligence or otherwise, or
from any use or operation of any methods, products, University College London, UK University of Washington, USA Naval Research Laboratory, USA North Carolina State University,
instructions or ideas contained in the material herein. Caroline Baillie Peter Goodhew Richard A. L. Jones USA
Because of rapid advances in the medical sciences, in
particular, independent verification of diagnoses and Queens University, Canada University of Liverpool, UK University of Sheffield, UK Marshall Stoneham FRS
drug dosages should be made.
Although all advertising material is expected to conform Zhenan Bao Hermann Grimmeiss Tae Won Noh University College London, UK
to ethical (medical) standards, inclusion in this Stanford University, USA Lunds Universitet, Sweden Seoul National University, Korea George Whitesides
publication does not constitute a guarantee or
endorsement of the quality or value of such product or Franco Cacialli Alan Heeger Stephen Pearton Harvard University, USA
of the claims made of it by its manufacturer. University College London, UK University of California, Santa University of Florida, USA Jackie Yi-Ru Ying
Printed by Headley Brothers Ltd, Kent, UK Robert Cahn FRS Barbara, USA Frans Spaepen Institute of Bioengineering and
ISSN 1369-7021
Journal number: 03069 University of Cambridge, UK George Jeronimidis Harvard University, USA Nanotechnology, Singapore
Martin Castell University of Reading, UK
University of Oxford, UK

OCTOBER 2006 | VOLUME 9 | NUMBER 10 1