LaTeX wants a $ where there shouldn't be one

Question

I have a variable name that I need to include mid-paragraph. The variable is called "oral_read_score". LaTeX seems to think that I meant the "r" and "s" to be subscripts, and gives an error unless I change to $oral_read_score$, which is not what I want. Is there some option I can use to turn this error off?

Answer 1

Two possibilities:

\documentclass{article}

\begin{document}

oral\_read\_score

\verb!oral_read_score!

\end{document}

LaTeX reserves the special character _ for math mode subscripts; you can escape this character using \_ for its use in text mode; the second option uses \verb to write the expression verbatim.

Answer 2

An alternative approach

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{underscore}
\begin{document}
oral_read_score
\end{document}