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Does anyone know of any evidence to indicate whether it is faster and/or easier for a native English speaker to recognise digits (1, 2, 3, 4) vs. full written English word equivalents (one, two, three, four)?

HaydnW
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    I'm not personally aware of any formal evidence or controlled study, but here's some informal evidence: people use the numeric form overwhelmingly more often. But maybe thats evidence that it's easier to write, rather than read, you say? Fair enough, fair enough: so tell me, which is bigger, one hundred and twenty seven trillion, nineteen million, six hundred and eleven thousand, two hundred and eighteen or one hundred and twenty seven trillion, nineteen billion, six hundred and eleven thousand, two hundred and six? Ok. Now which is bigger: 127,000,019,612,218 or 127,019,000,612,206? –  Aug 17 '15 at 11:30
  • @DanBron: +1, but what do hats have to do with it? ^_^ –  Aug 17 '15 at 11:33
  • Hats have to do with everything. –  Aug 17 '15 at 11:37
  • I agree entirely. However, I need to support my argument with some kind of evidence. I can't believe there's nothing peer-reviewed out there, I'm just not sure I'm using the correct terms when looking. Incidentally, in this instance I'm only working with the numbers 1 - 4 (or one to four!). – HaydnW Aug 17 '15 at 11:37
  • @HaydnW: Surely you could use Dan's prima facie example as evidence until something better comes along. You don't have to find a citation to assert that an elephant is larger than a mouse, do you? –  Aug 17 '15 at 11:41
  • @HaydnW The restriction to the range 1-4 changes the question a bit, or a lot. The nouns one, two, three, four are very common, very short (the longest is 5 letters), and very easy to parse. Now, they won't stand out in a text which is otherwise all alphabetical, but that's a different question. BTW, you could search for "style guides" numerals spell out, but that's about typography and style, not about cognitive load or ease of parsing. –  Aug 17 '15 at 12:01
  • @Robusto: I could, but a sample size of one person from the internet isn't particularly scientific compared to a properly conducted test (no disrespect to Dan Bron!). I'll struggle to find anyone who says a mouse is larger than an elephant, whereas I do have two conflicting parties for the digits vs. numbers argument, and need to convince one side (I'm not bothered which) that they are in the minority. – HaydnW Aug 17 '15 at 12:04
  • This kind of question would be better suited at [cogsci.se]. –  Aug 17 '15 at 12:09
  • @HaydnW: I agree with Dan that the 1-4 issue ("one to four" for people playing along at home) changes things somewhat. Still, I wasn't suggesting that you cite Dan's comment but copy it and submit it to the reader for parsing. Which is why I referred to "Dan's prima facie example" instead of his comment. –  Aug 17 '15 at 12:12
  • @HaydnW Hey! I'm not some guy from the internet, you're some guy from the internet ;) –  Aug 17 '15 at 12:16
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    @Dan: No, you are both some guys from the Internet, which I can prove because here I am in an office while you are out there on the Internet. QED. –  Aug 17 '15 at 12:30
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    I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it is not about the English language but about cognitive perception. –  Aug 17 '15 at 13:06
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    @Chenmunka Even if it were, my gut is such questions are still on topic. But I suspect this is really an X-Y problem: the OP says he's trying to arbitrate a dispute where one party asserts numerals are easier to read and the other asserts spelled-out numbers are easier to read, but I imagine that argument started out as "When writing formally, is it more correct to use numerals or to spell out numbers?", and as the debate evolved, the "cognitive perception" thing arose as an argument for one side or the other, and now is being used as a proxy. So the real answer is to refer to a style guide. –  Aug 17 '15 at 13:49
  • Thanks all. This is actually about usability, and how quickly someone can process the information conveyed by these numbers. Essentially they are answers on a form, and I need people to complete the form as quickly and easily as possible. The style is entirely self-defined and arbitrary, so there is no style guide right or wrong. It really does come down to which can be processed more easily (and if we're being really picky, which the user perceives to be processed more easily / quickly). – HaydnW Aug 17 '15 at 15:19
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    @HaydnW: sounds like it's possibly a UX issue? http://ux.stackexchange.com –  Aug 17 '15 at 16:12
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    @DanBron Even if it's marginally on-topic here, it will clearly get more informed answers at cogsci.se or ux.se. –  Aug 17 '15 at 21:36

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