Whether it’s solving the world’s biggest problems or investigating the potential of novel discoveries, researchers at UCF are on the edge scientific breakthroughs that aim to make an impact. Through the Research in 60 Seconds series, student and faculty researchers condense their complex studies into bite-sized summaries so you can know how and why Knights plan to improve our world.
Name: Ben Sawyer ’14MS ’15PhD
Position(s): Associate professor of industrial engineering and director of The Readability Consortium
Why are you interested in this research?
My mother was a children’s librarian focused on building collections, and my father was a high school teacher, and then a professor of education. My own early work was focused on attention and distraction, and I became fascinated by how people get information out of machine systems, and into their minds. My present research centers around human performance in reading: how can we best move information into your awareness, so you can do something with it.
Are you a faculty member or student conducting research at UCF? We want to hear from you! Tell us about your research at bit.ly/ucf-research-60-form.
Who inspires you to conduct your research?
I’m inspired by people working hard to understand [information, including] children, soldiers, analysts, physicians, and older adults all looking to find the information they need to get them to their goal and keep them safe on the way. My father worked with children with dyslexia, and it’s amazing how much parity I see between the struggles of those kids and the struggle of a physician trying to move through a 60-year medical history in a clunky interface in time to make a good decision for an anxious patient. I’m inspired by that struggle, which all of us face to a greater degree every day.
How does UCF empower you to do your research?
UCF provides access to a brilliant community of students and collaborators. Industrial engineering is a friendly and collaborative faculty. I’ve met so many fascinating students in my classes and have been privileged to have some of them join my research group. I have graduated a few of these as scientists and engineers. I love the diversity at UCF: people from every imaginable walk of life are on this campus, and the perspectives they bring to this research make it possible. Moreover, I like the people I get to work with, and I wake up every day happy to see them and excited to move our work forward. I feel very lucky in this.
What major grants and honors have you earned to support your research?
My readability research is primarily funded by industry. The consortium’s founding members Adobe and nonprofit Readability Matters provided the initial foundation for a community that now notably includes Google and Monotype. We also are beginning to work with these companies to attract state funding directly, including a 2023-24 $1 million appropriation from the State of Florida.
Why is this research important?
Billions of readers have too much to read. The information age is only as miraculous as our individual abilities to access infinite information. The written word, one of the great engineering accomplishments of human history, was literally developed on reeds and animal hide. This research is founded in the idea that writing and reading, is due for an update. Rebuilding the written word to help humans of the information age is also an opportunity for languages that have not benefited so strongly from the digital revolution. Mandarin, Arabic, Hindi, Bengali and other scripts are underserved by modern Latin alphabet centered digital infrastructure but are receiving large investments as billions of these readers move online. Our readability research provides an opportunity to build equity in these languages, while working from evidence-based first principles of readability.
