Sample Complexity Analysis
Personal Tax Credits Return

To illustrate the analysis method described in the first section of this manual, we will analyze the literacy tasks required to complete a common entry form, in this case the 2000 tax year version of the Personal Tax Credits Return (TD1 00). This form is completed by millions of Canadians at the beginning of the year, or when starting new employment. This form was chosen both for its familiarity and for the range of literacy tasks it requires of the form-filler. Completing the form requires a mix of prose, document and quantitative literacy tasks. Unlike forms which we might expect only to be completed by experts, this form is directed at the wider population whose literacy skills run from nonexistent to excellent.

To carry out this type of analysis, it is necessary to make several assumptions. First, we assume that an entry form is a common format for most Canadians and that they will be familiar with its conventions. For example, we assume that people will treat the label ‘name’ as roughly equivalent to the directive, “Enter your name here.” Some form designers also assume that many of the ‘navigation’ and ‘response mode’ instructions will be inferred by the form-filler. For example, this Tax Credits Return form omits a general instruction to “check each line on the form and enter tax credit amounts where applicable” although that is what is intended. Another convention is that the character separators in the ‘social insurance number’ and ‘date of birth’ boxes are a cue to the number of characters needed in the response, nine and eight characters respectively.

Secondly, we will assume that for entry-form tasks, the task of matching the label with information which fits that label is the primary task. This makes the task of entering information onto a form equivalent to searching a completed form for that information. In this view, locating a label ‘name’ and writing your name is no more difficult cognitively than locating the label ‘name’ and reading a corresponding name which has been entered there. Some federal departments have made this connection and now provide sample forms that demonstrate what kind of information should be entered onto the form, and how it should be entered.