I get irritated when an article shows up with an interesting headline but never gets directly to an assertion that the headline makes. Instead many words are stuffed into the front of the article before the “meat” of the article is presented. These stuffing words may be helpful to further explain the main point, or they may be filler words, words of “fluff”, to increase the word count. If they are helpful, they should be presented after the main assertion as further explanation. If the words are not helpful, they should be considered candidates for the trash can.
For example, in a Good Housekeeping article titled “How to Combat Inflammaging, the Aging Side Effect No One Talks About”, the main points were: “get moving, work on your balance, eat right, focus on your waistline, manage stress, spend quality time with others, and get good sleep.” These points were made at the end of the article. Ahead of them was the “word stuffing”. When I saw the “stuffing” I was encouraged not to combat inflammaging, but to write this complaint about this style or writing.
Putting the assertion of the headline at the end of the article, instead of at the front, makes the article itself easy to skip over.
