Verstaanbare vorms - 'n lesergerigte ondersoek na die effek van die veranderinge aan die Universiteit Stellenbosch se Afrikaanse voorgraadse aansoekvorm

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The purpose of this study was to gain more insight with regards to the comprehensibility ofthe revised Afrikaans undergraduate application form (see Form B in Excerpt 2) of theStellenbosch University (SU), especially in comparison to the previous version of 2011 (seeForm A in Excerpt 1), to be able to guide document designers with designing a better form.Answers to the following question were searched for: Do prospective students regard therevised Form B as more understandable than the previous Form A? The revised form waschanged by a team of experts, as requested by the SU, in order to make the form moreunderstandable. There were 140 male and female, white and coloured grade 11 respondentsof both Vredendal High and Vredendal Secondary.This study was launched in light of the South African Consumer Protection Act 68 of 2008that took effect on 1 April 2011. In terms of section 22 of this Act, documents must bewritten in plain and simple language, because consumers have got the right to informationthat they understand (2008:32).Plain language is practical attitudes about the meaning of good written work, the goal of thatand what benefits the reader the most. It is also our intellectual understanding of the way inwhich people read, the questions readers ask about a document, and readers' reaction towardsvarious forms of document design (De Stadler, 2012:3).Three parts of the two versions of the SU's Afrikaans undergraduate form was used,specifically the cover, the program and personal information, and the responsibility of theprospective student. The forms were judged according to its comprehensibility, design andlogic order by using a between-group design after respondents had to fill in the parts of theform by using fictional information on an information page. With that, respondents also hadto underline words in the form they didn't understand and fill in a questionnaire.Most of the information was statistically processed. To be able to make comparisons betweenthe forms, a twee-way-variance-analysis was done with alternative form/gender andform/race as independent variables.By using the data collected, it became clear that respondents didn't like a specific version ofthe form more than the other version. It also became clear that respondents had hugeproblems filling in both forms. Even though respondents perceived the form'scomprehensibility, design and logical build-up in the same way, more respondents left outquestions in Form B. This, against what we would have anticipated, means that respondentsmade better sense of Form A. It can even mean that, in contrast to their experience,respondents made more sense of the design and logical build-up of the questions in Form A,compared to the questions in Form B. This result is not a good outcome for the team ofexperts who made the changes to the revised form. It may be, however, that the SU didn'tallow the team to make enough changes, and because of that the forms are not reallyperceived as different from one another.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University