Doctoral Dissertations

Date of Award

8-1981

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Education

Major Professor

Edgar Ray Smith

Committee Members

J. J. Stallard, Don Reese, G. H. Whitlock, G. W. Wiegers Jr.

Abstract

This study was designed (a) to determine and compile the basic common words used in written business communications in Nigeria, (b) to determine the average stroke and syllabic intensities of the words used in written business communications in Nigeria, and (c) to determine if there was any significant difference between the ranking of the most-used 100 words in the written business communications in Nigeria and the ranking of the same words in the business word lists of Horn-Peterson, Mel linger, and Perry.

In order to secure data for this study, letters soliciting copies of two recently written letters, memoranda, or reports were mailed to 500 business organizations. A representative return from 74 percent of the sample produced 721 pieces of business communications used in the study. The body or message of each piece of letter, memorandum, or report was keypunched on data cards, and a programmed computer listed by frequency each word in the 721 business letters, memoranda and reports.

A total of 18,388 running words with 3,053 different words appeared in the business communications used in this study. The 3,053 different words were compiled as the basic common words used in written business communications in Nigeria; and the 18,388 running words were used in determining the average stroke intensity and the average syllabic intensity per word.

The Pearson Product-Moment Correlation was employed to determine if a significant relationship existed between the ranking of the 100 most frequently used words of this study and the ranking of the same words in the word lists of Horn-Peterson, Mellinger, and Perry.

The following were the major findings and recommendations of the study:

Major Findings

1. The ten most used words in written business communications in Nigeria used in this study accounted for 30 percent of the total word usage; 50 words accounted for 47 percent; 100 words, 55 percent; 200 words, 65 percent; 500 words, 76 percent; and 1,000 words, 88 percent of the total word usage.

2. The average stroke intensity of words appearing in the written business communications in Nigeria used in this study was 5.74.

3. The average syllabic intensity of words appearing in the written business communications in Nigeria used in this study was 1.58.

4. There was a strong positive relationship between the ranking of the most-used 100 words in the word list of this study and the ranking of the same words in the word lists of Horn-Peterson, Mellinger, and Perry; the correlation coefficients being significant at .01 level.

Recommendations

1. Since the first 1,000 words constitute over 3/4 of the vocabulary of the written business communications in Nigeria used in this study, business educators should ascertain that these words are given proper exposure so that students can thoroughly master these high frequency business words.

2. Since the average stroke intensity of words used in written business communications employed in this study is 5.6, authors and teachers of typewriting materials should adopt a new method of determining typewriting speed so as to match more closely the actual uses of typewriting skills in the business world. Therefore, 6.0 strokes should be used as the average word rather than 5.0 currently being used.

3. Since the syllabic intensity of the written business communications used in this study is 1.58, the syllabic intensity for shorthand practice and testing materials should be raised to 1.6 instead of the 1.4 currently being used so as to match the actual business communication criteria.

4. Since the high frequency words in the written business communications in Nigeria used in this study compare favorably with the high frequency words in the business word lists of Horn-Peterson, Mellinger, and Perry, textbooks printed in the United States of America for Nigerian schools should, as far as possible, incorporate the high frequency words in these word lists to avoid language difficulty for Nigerian students.

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