The experiment
Everyday Services Study
Does the wording of a public service change whether people understand it? Same flows, two registers, three languages.
Take the study About 15 minutes · anonymous
How it works
Participants do three simulated tasks: a bank transfer, a medical appointment and a driver’s licence renewal, in English, Spanish or Portuguese.Receiptthree tasks, three languagesEveryday Services Study designMethodBank transfer, medical appointment and licence renewal, in English, Spanish and Portuguese.Sourceeverydayservices.studyChecked Everyone sees identical flows. Half see plain wording; half see institutional wording. That is the only difference.
Five preregistered directional hypotheses cover understanding, explanation accuracy, prediction accuracy, confidence calibration and completion certainty.
Try the variable
The applicant shall submit the required documentation within the stipulated period, failing which the request shall be deemed void.
An example written for this page. The study’s own tasks are longer.
What the pilot showed
In the pilot (descriptive only), the plain-language arm scored about 1 on the CDI and the institutional arm about 38. Inferential results are pending peer review.Receiptabout 1 and about 38Pilot CDI by arm (descriptive)MethodFriends and family pilot, descriptive only. No inferential claim is made.SourceEveryday Services Study pilot write-up; résumé fact base (2026-08-10)Checked
The plain arm also took longer than expected, which led to a redesign before open recruitment.
Privacy and review
No names, emails, IP addresses or device IDs are collected. The study follows the Declaration of Helsinki, APA guidance, GDPR and LGPD. It is independent and has not been reviewed by a university ethics committee, as it states itself.