Before:

“The Dunbar number is actually a series of them. The best known, a hundred and fifty, is the number of people we call casual friends—the people, say, you’d The Dunbar number is actually a series of them. The best known, a hundred and fifty, is the number of people we call casual friends—the people, say, you’d invite to a large party. (In reality, it’s a range: a hundred at the low end and two hundred for the more social of us.) From there, through qualitative interviews coupled with analysis of experimental and survey data, Dunbar discovered that the number grows and decreases according to a precise formula, roughly a “rule of three.” The next step down, fifty, is the number of people we call close friends—perhaps the people you’d invite to a group dinner. You see them often, but not so much that you consider them to be true intimates. Then there’s the circle of fifteen: the friends that you can turn to for sympathy when you need it, the ones you can confide in about most things. The most intimate Dunbar number, five, is your close support group. These are your best friends (and often family members). On the flipside, groups can extend to five hundred, the acquaintance level, and to fifteen hundred, the absolute limit—the people for whom you can put a name to a face. While the group sizes are relatively stable, their composition can be fluid. Your five today may not be your five next week; people drift among layers and sometimes fall out of them altogether.”

After:

The Dunbar number is actually a series of different ones; the first and most well known is a hundred a fifty, the number of friends you’d invite to a dinner party or casual friends. After this number it was surveyed that the number grows and decreases at about a “rule of three”. The next number is fifty or the number of people we call close friends or those you’d invite to dinner. The next circle is fifteen these are the friends you turn to for sympathy and confide in. The last circle is five and is you closest and most intimate group. The largest groups can extend to five hundred when including acquaintances and fifteen hundred is seen to be the absolute limit of people who’s name we can put to faces. While the numbers themselves are relatively concrete the people in each group can fluctuate quite frequently.

I used less language and made it shorter and easier to digest as a reader. This paper wasn’t very long but I felt in this paragraph specifically was a lot to try and digest as a reader. There’s a lot of very important information here so it should be easy to understand yet I thought it was slightly convoluted. This in turn made the paragraph shorter but I think it made it easier to understand.