If the phrase “time is money” is true, then it certainly behooves us to try to minimize the amount of time it takes to do any task.  As someone who reads an awful lot each day, I have been particularly sensitive to the time it takes me to read something (in case you haven’t noticed, on the main page of this blog, I even let you know the estimated amount of time needed to read each post!).  Over the years I have put together some ways to read faster - instantly.

We have all seen or heard about “speed reading” books, courses, and even audio tapes, yet most of us never have the money, time, will, or believe that we will be successful in using them.  I am one of those people, and that is why I have developed my “instant” fix.

Surgeon General’s Warning: My method shouldn’t dissuade you from actually trying out a speed reading system.  My method’s results won’t be as dramatic as a real speed reading course’s results would be.

This technique works best with digital text, since we are going to manipulate it, but it can be somewhat passed on to text on pages.  The best tool to use is Microsoft Word or your open-source alternative, since it allows you to easily change large amounts of text.

Contrast

Contrast is the difference in visual properties that makes an object (or its representation in an image) distinguishable from other objects and the background. In visual perception of the real world, contrast is determined by the difference in the color and brightness of the object and other objects within the same field of view.

That excerpt is from the useful Wikipedia.  I figured (correctly) that they would have a better definition than I could come up with.  Contrast basically allows us to tell the difference between the background and the text, so it becomes very important if you want to read quickly.  The sooner your brain can distinguish and identify the word from its background, the faster you will read the word.  The best contrast you can have is between black text and a white background.

Columns

In order to read a sentence, your eyes need to be able to follow a line of the words and send that message to your brain.  The problem with this is that you are very likely, especially if you are somewhat tired, to have trouble following the same line across a full screen’s width. The solution to this is to make fairly narrow columns.  My personal favorite is about 3.5-4 inches wide.  This is often narrow enough for you to read the whole line at once, instead of looking individually at each word.  Your brain will “chunk” the information together, and allow you to read it quicker.

Font

Font Type
Fonts generally fall into two categories: Serif and Sans-Serif.  Although Sans-Serif fonts, such as Arial, are the most common to appear on a website, I don’t like them.  I prefer Serif fonts, such as Times New Roman, which have little features at the end of each side, making it easier to read.  Some studies suggest that this is just because people are more familiar with Serif fonts.  Personally, I don’t really care what the reason for the faster read is - I just care about the fact that your read it faster.

Font Size
I generally choose font size 11, but those of you who are sensitive to the size of your text will likely prefer size 12.  The idea behind the smaller font size is that smaller text fits more words in per square inch in an organized manner.  This means your eye has to travel less to see the same amount of words.  In fact, if you set up your columns correctly (as I discussed above), your eyes will most likely be able to read the whole sentence without moving position at all.  All of the words will be within your field of vision - without scanning.

Layout

When most people write or read a word document, they are doing so in “Normal Layout” (View > Normal in Word).  This usually leaves way too much whitespace, and it tricks you mind into ignoring or at least trying to smooth text right out of your picture.  This means the relative amount of text to the amount of whitespace around it is very low, so your brain by default pretends the “big white box” is of more importance to you than the “tiny black text/shapes”.  To get yourself out of the boxing ring with your brain’s nature, you have two options.  I generally click onto “Print Layout” (View > Print Layout) and get the dark gray background around each page.  This serves both to “format” the text, as well as to get rid of a lot of the whitespace in my visual field.  For those of you who want a quick fix which kills two birds with one stone, you can choose “Reading Layout” (View > Reading Layout), and Word will automatically place two separate pages, in two columns, side by side for you.

Zoom

If you decide to use the “Print Layout”, as I do, there is one last step which is important.  This step involves finding the “Zoom” level (by default at 100%) and changing it to 75%.  This change will make the text appear at the right true size, and will also give you the right amount of gray background to focus your eyes better.

This method has allowed me to read much faster, and I didn’t need to spend any more money, or a significant amount of time.  Hopefully, it will serve you well too.