Which term refers to the process of loosening or tightening a block of text?

The process of loosening or tightening a block of text is referred to as tracking. Tracking involves adjusting the spacing between characters in a block of text uniformly across multiple letters, which affects the overall appearance of the text. When you increase tracking, you create more space between all characters, making the text appear more open, while decreasing tracking tightens the characters together, which can create a denser look. This technique is commonly used in graphic design and typesetting to improve readability or achieve a specific aesthetic effect in text layouts.

Leading, on the other hand, specifically refers to the vertical space between lines of text, while kerning is the adjustment of space between specific pairs of letters to improve visual appearance. Spacing is a more general term and does not specifically refer to the uniform adjustment of character spacing in a block of text as tracking does.