The following appeared in an article written by Dr. Karp, an anthropologist.
“Twenty years ago, Dr. Field, a noted anthropologist, visited the island of Tertia and concluded from his observations that children in Tertia were reared by an entire village rather than by their own biological parents. However, my recent interviews with children living in the group of islands that includes Tertia show that these children spend much more time talking about their biological parents than about other adults in the village. This research of mine proves that Dr. Field's conclusion about Tertian village culture is invalid and thus that the observation-centered approach to studying cultures is invalid as well. The interview-centered method that my team of graduate students is currently using in Tertia will establish a much more accurate understanding of child-rearing traditions there and in other island cultures.”
Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.
It is analysed from the argument that the child-rearing traditions in tertia are misunderstood by Dr. Fields, due to inaccuracy in his observation approach, and that the interview-centered approach took by the students of Dr. Karp provides a better understanding of the child-rearing traditions there. The effectiveness of the argument could be verified by looking into three questions.
Was the sample of children selected for interviewing, representative enough? Were children of different age groups taken into consideration and interviewed? For instance, it is possible that the majority of children interviewed, were shy and introverts, that they do not mingle well with the adults of the village, other than their biological parents. Maybe some of the children were orphans or lost either of their biological parents that they missed them and tended to talk more about them. Children merge with the society more as they grow older and tend to stick with their parents during their early years of life. Maybe such young childrens, who were mature enough to converse with adults were interviewed. If either the above assumptions are true, then the argument is flawed.
Was the interview done during the same time period when Dr. Fields had observed the their traditions? Things change from time to time, so does the feeling of the children. For example, it is possible that when the interview took place, a part of the village migrated to an another place, in search of food and other essentials. Maybe the group included the biological parents of some of the children interviewed. Since they were not in close proximity to their children, they mighty have yearned for their presence, and that just reflected in their answers. If there was such an occurrence, then the argument is considerably flawed.
Were the questions shooted, good enough to learn about the child-rearing tradition in the village? The interview was not done by Dr. Karp himself, but by his graduate students. It is possible that the majority of questions asked were not related to the experiment, and it had contained only few questions of use to the experiment. Maybe the questions were more related to their biological parents and not about the other adults in the village. The argument would be flawed if it does not have a valid answer for the above statements.
The argument had contained many assumptions and some of them were discussed above. If there are more evidences that can counter-attach the assumptions, the effectiveness of the argument could be checked even better. A strong research study is necessary to find further evidence and to check the viability of the argument.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 23 15
No. of Words: 435 350
No. of Characters: 2182 1500
No. of Different Words: 187 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.567 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.016 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.832 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 146 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 115 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 92 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 54 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 18.913 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 8.156 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.348 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.305 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.498 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.082 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 5, column 359, Rule ID: SOME_OF_THE[1]
Message: Simply use 'some'.
Suggestion: some
...er than their biological parents. Maybe some of the children were orphans or lost either of...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 531, Rule ID: COMP_THAN[1]
Message: Comparison requires 'than', not 'then' nor 'as'.
Suggestion: than
...m. Children merge with the society more as they grow older and tend to stick with ...
^^
Line 9, column 81, Rule ID: DT_PRP[1]
Message: Possible typo. Did you mean 'the' or 'their'?
Suggestion: the; their
...ime period when Dr. Fields had observed the their traditions? Things change from time to ...
^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 271, Rule ID: AN_ANOTHER[1]
Message: One of these determiners is redundant in this context. Choose only one: 'a place' or 'another place'.
Suggestion: a place; another place
...lace, a part of the village migrated to an another place, in search of food and other essentials...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 380, Rule ID: SOME_OF_THE[1]
Message: Simply use 'some'.
Suggestion: some
...roup included the biological parents of some of the children interviewed. Since they were n...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 437, Rule ID: CLOSE_SCRUTINY[1]
Message: Use simply 'proximity'.
Suggestion: proximity
...ren interviewed. Since they were not in close proximity to their children, they mighty have yea...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, if, look, may, so, then, well, for example, for instance
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 27.0 19.6327345309 138% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 4.0 12.9520958084 31% => OK
Conjunction : 13.0 11.1786427146 116% => OK
Relative clauses : 12.0 13.6137724551 88% => OK
Pronoun: 35.0 28.8173652695 121% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 62.0 55.5748502994 112% => OK
Nominalization: 17.0 16.3942115768 104% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2252.0 2260.96107784 100% => OK
No of words: 435.0 441.139720559 99% => OK
Chars per words: 5.17701149425 5.12650576532 101% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.56690854021 4.56307096286 100% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.94089394243 2.78398813304 106% => OK
Unique words: 202.0 204.123752495 99% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.464367816092 0.468620217663 99% => OK
syllable_count: 684.0 705.55239521 97% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 6.0 4.96107784431 121% => OK
Article: 7.0 8.76447105788 80% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 2.70958083832 148% => OK
Conjunction: 4.0 1.67365269461 239% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 2.0 4.22255489022 47% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 23.0 19.7664670659 116% => OK
Sentence length: 18.0 22.8473053892 79% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 51.3501269595 57.8364921388 89% => OK
Chars per sentence: 97.9130434783 119.503703932 82% => OK
Words per sentence: 18.9130434783 23.324526521 81% => OK
Discourse Markers: 2.65217391304 5.70786347227 46% => More transition words/phrases wanted.
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 6.0 5.25449101796 114% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 6.0 8.20758483034 73% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 10.0 4.67664670659 214% => Less facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.163342640858 0.218282227539 75% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0449166965645 0.0743258471296 60% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0423410812106 0.0701772020484 60% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0910715780914 0.128457276422 71% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0504962752732 0.0628817314937 80% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.4 14.3799401198 86% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 53.21 48.3550499002 110% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.3 12.197005988 84% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.76 12.5979740519 101% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.91 8.32208582834 95% => OK
difficult_words: 93.0 98.500998004 94% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 12.5 12.3882235529 101% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.2 11.1389221557 83% => OK
text_standard: 13.0 11.9071856287 109% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.