Book People Archive

Ang: "preferred fonts" for people with dyslexia

mrobertson@[redacted] wrote, apropos typefaces suitable for dyslexic readers:

>Here are the fonts: [Trebuchet MS, Arial, Geneva, Comic Sans]

  It's curious to note that type designers involved with the design of 
traffic signs have complained about how easy it is to confuse Helvetica
(and it's very near relatives Arial and Geneva) letters, particularly
lower case l and upper case I (and occasionally even the digit 1).
S and 8 (and 5) are are also thought to be not sufficiently well
differentiated -- Helvetica has a very 'closed' S, almost an '8'. 
Similar problems may occur with uppercase O and digit 0.  And this is
by readers without any disabilities.

  Traffic signs should be readable regardless of weather, eye 
position, and even graffiti -- I would suspect that a typeface that is
good on a traffic sign might also be good for dyslexic readers. For
that reason I wonder at Arial and Geneva in the list above.

  One I like to use for signs is SISPOS (designed by Bo Berndal), and 
available commercially under the name Bosis. (As it's a sign face, there
is no italic, but that may not be a drawback in this context.)

  Lucida Sans, Meta and Gill Sans are also three highly legible designs.

  But if Arial/Geneva are considered good typefaces, perhaps these 
have flaws that aren't obvious to the eye.

/Anders Thulin