Why do English writers avoid explicit numerals?

Question

The junction has a stop sign on each of the four entrances.
The junction has a stop sign on each of the 4 entrances.

The first is preferred, for some reason, by many English texts. Why? I haven't seen this phenomenon in other languages.

Answer 1

I have also noticed when reading French and Spanish texts, that it is quite normal to write numbers below ten in full as well, e.g. "los tres hombres que..." instead of "los 3 hombres que..."

My guess is that writing numbers in full in a European language is easier than using Roman numerals, which were the mainstay until the Arabic-Hindu number system came to Europe. Eg, it is easier to understand "one hundred and fourty five" than it is to understand CVL or CXLV or CXXXXV, which are all different and valid ways of writing 145, with CXXXXV being the most common. Clumsy. So after the vastly superior Hindu-Arabic system was adopted in Europe, the habit of writing numbers as words would have remained.

English, being a European language, would have kept similar habits as per the other European languages.

Today, it is a simply an issue of style, so it is not wrong to always write numbers with numerals or to always write them in full. For instance, APA recommends that numbers below 10 are written in full, while numbers 10 and above are written with numerals. The Chicago Manual of Style recommends that all numbers below 100 are written in full, with numbers above 100 written as numerals.

Both style guides prohibit mixing spelt out numbers with numbers expressed as numerals, favouring numerals for all numbers when they are mixed. But my local newspaper, quite happily mixes numbers 1-9 spelt out, and higher numbers expressed with numerals.

The rules in both style guides (and others) are actually a lot more comprehensive than that, but I see no reason to include them here.

Most high schools teach similar rules in their English classes, which leads to everybody being accustomed to writing numbers out in full. In addition, as everybody is used to seeing numbers expressed like that in their novels, newspapers, and other texts, it becomes further engrained in the psyche of English writers.

Answer 2

I had the impression that while it does boil down to a matter of style, the rule of thumb was "if you are writing words (i.e. English prose), use the word form, and if you are writing numbers (i.e. math) use the numerals", until the word form becomes so large as to become cumbersome.

Answer 3

Generally, numbers up to twenty are written as a word, because it is just one word. Go any further than twenty and you are dealing with compound words, which I guess people don't like very much. So numbers greater than twenty are written as numerals.

Answer 4

Switching from letters to numbers is jarring. It almost shouts out as you, as numbers are often as tall as uppercase letters in typefaces. I much prefer to write and read I have six passports than I have 6 passports.

It can come across as overly lazy as well, along the lines of I have six pprts.

Answer 5

I don't have a source, so this might be an useless answer, but in Norwegian the rule is the same, however only up to and including twelve. 13 on the other hand should be written with explicit numerals. No clue as to why.

Answer 6

Further to other answers, one reason you may wish to write out large numbers in full is if the meaning or pronunciation needs to be clarified. For example, does 123 represent "one hundred and twenty-three," or "one-two-three"?

Answer 7

The rules I've learned are:

Use words unless the number is:

• not round ("two million" vs. "723" and "1.3 billion"),
• used in an address, phone number, filing, score, time, date or other enumeration systems ("Pier 17", "cabin 02", "2:0 for the Lakers" vs. "twenty seven students").

As for your example, the entrances are not enumerated in any system. Therefore:

The junction has a stop sign on each of the four entrances.

Answer 8

French writers are taught to use words to write numbers and figures whenever sensible, without a conventional limit to twelve.

The main reason, as already stated by another answerer, is a matter of uniformity in the resulting page. I remember being advised not to write "17e siècle" (17th century), but "dix-septième siècle", eventually XVIIe as a tolerance.

Moreover, in France, when you write a personal check, which is still quite common compared to other countries, you have to write the sum in full prose, such as "trente-et-un euros et dix centimes", besides a numerical version (here 31,10), and the "word" version of the sum has precedence over the numerical one if there is a discrepancy. Credit cards make this less prominent but this used to be a source of difficulty for everyday life of illiterates.

Answer 9

English writers avoid explicit numerals in text to maintain consistency, which is a chief goal in any written work. How/why is consistency maintained by avoiding explicit numerals? Two answers:

1. According to my dictionary (New Oxford American Dictionary, 2nd Ed), one definition of text is

   written or printed words...

   Numerals are not words. Thus, using them in text creates an inconsistency that many writers would like to avoid.

2. The numerals are Arabic and if the text is to be consistently in English, they must be strictly avoided within the body of the text.

I must note that writers of scientific articles, news articles, and other texts where numbers are important, use Arabic numerals within text at will.

Answer 10

My typography tutor (UK) taught me the convention was to use words for numbers from one to ten and digits for 11 upwards. Maybe because single digits look lonely, 1 can be confused with I when scan-reading (certainly in san serif fonts where 1, lower case L and capital I are exactly the same)? Perhaps this is a decimalised version of the German one-to-twelve rule mentioned above

Answer 11

The real reason is because the style dictators don't use many large numbers in their writing and their choice in favour of words (for the small numbers that do occur in their writing) is both aesthetic and possibly math phobic.

For other people, the convention causes an unaesthetic inconsistency in that small numbers are written in words and large numbers are in numerals. The convention may not be suitable for all writers and I have abandoned it in favour of numerals for everything.

Answer 12

It's important to remember that in technical contexts, numerals are preferred. For example, "In one experiment, the result was 1."

The main hurdle to overcome is to learn that in technical contexts, we use numerals in text, even ones below 10. In other words, we break the rules that are taught in regular writing courses and that are used in normal publishing and copyediting practice. That's because in the technical and scientific context, we are vitally interested in numbers, statistical data, even if it's a 2 or 5 or—yes—even a 0. ... You should use numerals, not words, when the number is a key value, an exact measurement value, or both.

More detailed examples at Online Technical Writing

8.1.2 In technical text or measurements:
To express numerical information in mathematical, statistical, or scientific text, always use numerals.
9 centimeters
14 square feet
240 volts
5 degrees Celsius