User Attitudes Toward Corporate Style Guides: A Survey
http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/stc/tc/1996/00000043/00000003/art00005
  access restricted (by the publisher) to members/subscribers/customers only
  peer-reviewed

Allen, Paul R.
Technical Communication Online
1996

Abstract:

Little information is known on user attitudes toward corporate style guides (CSGs). A national survey shows that an overwhelming 93% of users and 85% of non-users advocate CSG usage primarily to generate consistency in documents, to save time generating documents, and to create a professional look in documents. As corporations face the future by restructuring, usually by downsizing, and by competing more in a global economy, CSG usage will be more prevalent in corporate America, as the results of this survey indicate that CSGs are an economical quality tool that benefits both the user and the corporation.