The principles of readability are in every style manual. Readability formulas are in every word processor. What is missing is the research and theory on which they stand.

.............................................................................................................................5 Chapter 1---Introduction.....................................................................................................7 Chapter 2---Previous Research on Scientific Discourse.........................................................17 Characterizing Scientific Proposal Writers............................................................18 A Description of Science Adapted from Cognitive Psychology......................19 A Description of Science Adapted from Organizational Behavior................22 A Description of Science Adapted from the Sociology of Science...................25 The Historical Dichotomy Between Science and Rhetoric........................................28 The Contemporary Rhetorical Interest in Scientific Discourse..................................33 The Interaction Between Cognition and Context............................................

Support from two sources allowed me to devote the better part of two years to the research and writing of this dissertation—from a Digital Equipment Corporation/Carnegie Mellon Fellowship and from the Engineering Design Research Center at Carnegie Mellon. As well, the support of my committee members—Karen Schriver, Erwin Steinberg, and Dave Kaufer—had a significant influence on my motivation to carry out the project and, ultimately, on the final written product. Finally (and acknowledgment pages always seem to beg our listing anyone we’ve ever known), I’d like to thank my family, Mom and Dad, for continuing to ask me when I’m going to be finished, and Jeff and Barb and Emma, for not asking me when I’m going to be finished. Special thanks to Mike Domach for his technical expertise, guidance, and general irreverence; to Joseph Petraglia, especially, and to Charlie Hill for their endless and (sometimes painfully) perceptive feedback on every draft of every chapter; to Jim Palmer, Tom Duffy, and Maria Truschel, for making my first two years at Carnegie Mellon as stimulating and as challenging as they were; to Jane Kalbfleisch, for helping me survive the dissertation-writing process; and to Carole Chaski, Nancy Penrose, Steve Katz, Mike Carter, and Carolyn Miller at North Carolina