Many beginner and even intermediate-level writers opt to employ Arabic numerals. A number reduces the amount of typing, conserves space on the page, and therefore seems more efficient, at least on the surface.
What’s wrong with Arabic numerals? Nothing, if you base your writing style upon the news media. Take this recent group of headlines found on Yahoo News:
Gunman kills 3 officers, wounds 4th in Oakland (AP)
Treasury's toxic asset plan could cost $1 trillion (AP)
Pope decries African wars at Mass for 1 million (AP)
Tibetans attack police station, 93 monks arrested (AP)
When reading these headlines, the mind requires a few extra milliseconds to decode the numerals into their English equivalents. This is because we associate numbers with a different set of skills such as counting, adding, and subtracting. Numbers are used in math classes, not reading classes. Words are more strongly tied to images in the mind.
Unconvinced? Pick up a book by any best-selling author. Open it up to random pages and search for Arabic numerals. The page numbers don't count. My wager is that the author spells out the vast majority of numbers, with a few exceptions here and there for large numbers—anything over a hundred, say, or in cases where there are many numbers joined together by conjunctions, commas, or in a list. Or, in the case of Stephen King's short story, "1408", the author wishes to draw the reader's attention to the number because it is an integral part of the plot.
The reason that pro writers do this is because the human eye scans words faster than numbers. Most writers, and all of the popular ones, have a powerful motive to render their work as easy to scan as possible. For the same reason, a popular author uses correct punctuation and grammar, avoids fifty dollar words, and employs the popular American vernacular.
Why does the news media represent a glaring exception to this rule? First of all, because their headlines have limited space and a journalist can fit more Arabic numerals than words into a line. Also, numbers catch the reader’s attention, which is the primary function of headlines. “$1 trillion” seems more dramatic than “one trillion.” As a writer, you don’t want to draw the reader’s attention to mere numbers, and you’re not limited to the confines of a headline.
I’ve argued this point with enough writers (two in recent memory) to blog about it. This advice is not original from me, but derives from criticism that a smart college grad gave me a couple of years ago when reviewing my writing. My stories had numerals strewn throughout. What compounded the problem was that in many cases I was employing either a numeral or the written word. If you insist upon using numerals, at least be consistent. Employ one technique or the other throughout your work.
I didn’t buy his manifesto against numerals at first. But sometimes I let new ideas ferment in the attic upstairs until they taste better. Breaking the lifelong habit of using Arabic numerals requires a good deal of effort. Some writers either won’t see the point or won’t want to bother. Better for you, then, to stand out as a better writer by adopting the technique used by the pros.
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