reader-aware-writing

name	reader-aware-writing
description	Draft, revise, critique, or transform writing for a clearly defined reader, especially scientific and academic articles. Use for reader-centered writing, audience orientation, cohesion, coherence, paragraph flow, abstracts, introductions, results, discussions, reviewer-facing revision, or adapting technical depth across reader expertise levels.

Reader Aware Writing

Overview

Use this skill to make writing land with the person who will read it. The core move is to build a lightweight reader model, revise around that reader's job, and preserve truth while improving clarity, cohesion, trust, and actionability.

For scientific writing, treat reader-centeredness as a form of rigor: the text should prepare the reader for each concept, make the argument's logic visible, distinguish evidence from interpretation, and avoid forcing the reader to infer missing links.

Workflow

1. Identify the reader and their job.

   • Capture the reader role, expertise level, purpose for reading, decision or action needed, likely constraints, objections, and desired tone.
   • If the reader is unclear, infer a plausible reader from the artifact and state the assumption briefly. Ask only when the missing reader changes the work materially.
   • For scientific articles, build a compact reader contract before drafting: reader role, what the reader already knows, what they likely do not know, the reader's first question, the reader's likely confusion, and the article promise.
   • For complex or high-stakes writing, read reader-model.md.

2. Choose the work mode and artifact type.

   • Compose: create new writing from goals and context.
   • Revise: improve an existing draft while preserving meaning.
   • Critique: diagnose where the text mismatches the reader.
   • Transform: adapt one artifact for another audience or channel.
   • Compare: explain how multiple reader versions differ.
   • For abstracts, introductions, results, discussions, or full manuscripts, read scientific-article.md.

3. Build the reader path before drafting.

   • Privately map each paragraph or section to the reader question it answers.
   • Sequence those questions so each answer prepares the next question.
   • Identify any concept, method, variable, result, or implication that needs a bridge before it appears.
   • For scientific articles, make the paragraph path explicit enough to test: each paragraph should have one reader question, one governing answer, and one handoff to the next reader question.
   • If two paragraphs answer the same reader question, merge or sharpen their roles. If one paragraph answers two unrelated questions, split it.
   • Omit this planning map from the final answer unless the user asks for reasoning or critique.

4. Make the reader path obvious.

   • Start with what the reader needs to know, decide, or do.
   • Put context before details, but do not bury the point.
   • Match density to expertise: define terms for newcomers, compress basics for experts, and expose assumptions for decision-makers.
   • Replace author-centered phrasing with reader-centered stakes, actions, and consequences.
   • Preserve required facts, caveats, citations, constraints, and the user's intended voice.
   • For academic introductions, paragraphs, cohesion, or coherence, read academic-writing.md and cohesion-coherence.md.

5. Revise for trust.

   • Separate facts from interpretation.
   • Name uncertainty without over-apologizing.
   • Prefer concrete claims, examples, and decision criteria over vague reassurance.
   • Remove jargon unless it is native to the reader's working vocabulary.
   • Avoid inventing evidence, metrics, policies, or citations.
   • For scientific articles, silently classify important statements on a claim ladder: observation, result, mechanistic evidence, model-supported interpretation, implication, speculation, and forbidden upgrade. Downgrade or remove any statement that exceeds the supplied evidence.
   • For sentence-level scientific clarity, active/passive choices, nominalization, modifiers, parallelism, and punctuation, read scientific-style.md.

6. Finish with a reader check.

   • Use revision-rubric.md for substantive revisions, high-stakes writing, or explicit review requests.
   • For scientific article drafting, run the paragraph gates before returning: orientation, unity, bridge, evidence/interpretation order, exit handoff, and claim strength.
   • If useful, provide a concise change note explaining the reader-specific choices.

Scientific Article Operating Protocol

Use this protocol when composing a scientific article from notes, a dossier, a paper, or experimental results. Keep the protocol hidden unless the user requests an audit or reasoning.

1. Reader contract.

   • Reader role: who is reading and why.
   • Already knows: concepts the reader can be expected to know.
   • Likely gaps: concepts, methods, organisms, variables, or stakes that need preparation.
   • First question: what the reader needs answered before details matter.
   • Likely confusion: where the reader may lose the thread.
   • Article promise: what the article will make clear without exceeding the evidence.

2. Paragraph-question path.

   • Draft a one-line question for each planned paragraph or section.
   • Put the questions in the order the reader should ask them.
   • Ensure each answer prepares the next question.
   • Do not include a paragraph whose reader question is unclear.

3. Claim ladder.

   • Mark major claims internally as observation, result, mechanistic evidence, model-supported interpretation, implication, speculation, or forbidden upgrade.
   • Keep observations and results close to their evidence.
   • Signal model-supported interpretations with bounded language.
   • Remove forbidden upgrades: causal, clinical, mechanistic, translational, or novelty claims not supported by the source.

4. Paragraph gates.

   • Orientation: the first sentence tells the reader why this paragraph exists.
   • Unity: every sentence serves the same reader question.
   • Bridge: new concepts, methods, variables, subgroups, mechanisms, and limitations are introduced before they are used.
   • Evidence order: evidence appears before interpretation when the reader needs proof; interpretation appears before details when the reader first needs the point.
   • Handoff: the final sentence closes the local point or prepares the next paragraph.
   • Term discipline: repeat stable technical terms until the reader has a firm thread; avoid premature synonym swaps.

5. Final reader-path pass.

   • Read only the first sentence of each paragraph. They should form a coherent mini-outline.
   • Read only the final sentence of each paragraph. The handoffs should not feel abrupt.
   • Check that the central claim can be stated in one sentence and that every section serves it.
   • Return the article only unless the user asked for the hidden reader contract, paragraph path, or audit table.

Reader-First Rules

Use these rules as defaults when drafting or revising:

• No unexplained novelty: introduce a new idea only after it has been named, implied, or explicitly motivated.
• One paragraph, one reader question: each paragraph should answer or develop one question the reader has at that point.
• Old before new: begin sentences with familiar information when possible; place new, complex, or emphasized information later.
• Signpost structural shifts: mark contrasts, turns, implications, changes of scale, and moves from evidence to interpretation.
• Handoff between sections: end or begin sections with enough shared language that the reader understands why the next section follows.
• Repeat key terms before varying them: premature synonym use can break the reader's thread.
• Do not simplify by default: expert readers may need more precision, stronger caveats, or clearer methods rather than easier vocabulary.

Output Rules

• When the user asks for rewritten text, lead with the rewritten text.
• When the user asks for critique, lead with the highest-impact reader mismatches.
• When the user asks for multiple audiences, label each version by reader and keep the differences intentional.
• Keep meta commentary short unless the user asks for reasoning.
• Do not turn every edit into a generic simplification; reader-aware writing may become more technical, more direct, warmer, shorter, or more detailed depending on the reader.
• For scientific revisions, do not invent data, methods, results, citations, mechanisms, limitations, or implications. If evidence is missing, mark the gap or phrase the claim conditionally.

Agent Portability

This skill follows the portable Agent Skills structure: one SKILL.md with name and description, plus optional resources. For placement in Codex, Claude, or another agent, read agent-portability.md.