International Journal of Business Communication

Professor Robert Hay rebuts the editorial judgment of John Alderson's research report in the Spring issue of the Journal and in his turn questions the editor's understanding of an effective letter. George Douglas then clarifies his earlier statements and reiterates some of his criticisms.

Business letters create images: those employing "good" business writing prin ciples evoke positive images; those not so structured evoke negative images. An after-only experiment, using the semantic differential for measurement, pro vides consistent support for the empirical validity of good writing principles.

The author of this article believes that data communications will make revo lutionary changes in the field of business communications, and that teachers in the field should immediately become aware of the main problems which data communications technology presents and introduce discussion of these problems into the curriculum.