34 – The negative link between big words and credibility

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The best title for a research paper that I ever read was written by Oppenheimer and its consequences of

erudite vernacular utilized irrespective of necessity. Problems with using long words needlessly.

I'll link to that paper in the show notes. The title demonstrates the problem that it describes right

within that title. It's harder to read than it needs to be.

And many experiments detailed that there's a consistent negative relationship between how complex the

vocabulary is and how intelligence was judged by others. More complex the word, the less likely it is to

accept the writer regardless of the quality. So it's really common for people to deliberately use more

complex words to appear smart, even though it actually backfires.

So why are complex words hurting episodes or our scripts, the things that we put online?

Listeners don't like the unnecessary friction that these words causes. And removing that friction by

using simpler words makes building trust or building that connection up a lot easier. Complex words make

our brains work hard.

And that processing, all that work, is subconsciously placed onto the competence of the person using

those words instead of the actual ideas that are being expressed. So this idea is a tough one for me because

some words, including one in that Oppenheimer paper research title vernacular, among a few other

reasons, I just love the sound and feel of certain words, which I understand is not uncommon amongst us.

Autistic Humans. Once in an improv scene, a teacher started a whole conversation after the scene was over

about what era my character came from because I used the word reckon. And that's just a word I use all the

time. I wasn't trying to use it as something to define that character. So simple language creates what's

called cognitive fluency. And this is when information flows really easily.

as a signal of quality. So the speaker must be competent and smart because the ideas landed smoothly. And

this is more important for audio and video content because it's a lot more awkward to pause and go somewhere

else to look up a word. But like in a digital article or a book, it's often a lot easier for the person reading

it to just go look up the word. You aren't going to probably do that with this podcast. So the takeaway here is

to remove the words that are unnatural.

Right. Asking ourselves, honestly, like, why are we using that word that isn't just super common? Now, if

it's a word that you genuinely use, keep it. Right. But if it's a big word just for the sake of sounding smart,

that's a word that you want to get rid of. And except that some words we might use, we just don't realize are

uncommon. Like when I used reckon, it was just really normal for me, but apparently not for others.

But it's one that I actually just use. So do the best that you can. Try for the simplest version of your ideas,

which is generally going to be, by science at least, the most persuasive ones. I'm Jen DeHaan. This is a

Credibility Minute, and you can find more episodes and get in touch with me at stereoforest.com.