The following appeared in a health newsletter.
"A ten-year nationwide study of the effectiveness of wearing a helmet while bicycling indicates that ten years ago, approximately 35 percent of all bicyclists reported wearing helmets, whereas today that number is nearly 80 percent. Another study, however, suggests that during the same ten-year period, the number of bicycle-related accidents has increased 200 percent. These results demonstrate that bicyclists feel safer because they are wearing helmets, and they take more risks as a result. Thus, to reduce the number of serious injuries from bicycle accidents, the government should concentrate more on educating people about bicycle safety and less on encouraging or requiring bicyclists to wear helmets."
Write a response in which you examine the stated and/or unstated assumptions of the argument. Be sure to explain how the argument depends on these assumptions and what the implications are for the argument if the assumptions prove unwarranted.
The author of a health newsletter claims that in order to reduce bicycle accidents, governments should enforce bicycle education on society rather than using helmets. However, the argument is not cogent enough to enforce the recommendation. While the argument may have some merit, because of the unaddressed assumptions, the argument is unsubstantiated and deeply flawed.
Firstly, the author assumes that citizens have increased usage in helmet gear only to feel safe. The author provided evidence stating that in a ten-year period, the usage of helmets went from 35% to a current state of 80%. The author assumes that the only reason helmets have increased is due to a sense of feeling safe. However, the evidence does not support the assumption. A smaller percentage of people using helmets ten years ago may be due to a small population of bicycle riders. Therefore, it could be that 80% of the people today using helmets is due to an increasing population of bicycle riders. If that were the case, then the evidence would not support the assumption. What the author should do is provide data or an open-ended survey that specifies the reason why more people are using helmets than ten years ago. If not, then the assumption would be unwarranted.
Secondly, the author assumes that an increase in bicycle accidents occurred because more people are taking risks. The author provides evidence that in the same ten-year period, 200% of bicycle accidents increased. While the evidence may prove that bike riders are more risky, the evidence does not support the assumption. Perhaps, within the ten-year period, more cars have appeared on the road. Car drivers may be the ones causing the accidents while bike riders are taking safety measures. Therefore, the assumption is unwarranted. The author must provide substantial evidence proving the bike riders are taking more risks, such as reports on the reasons why accidents have occurred. If the reports state that bicycle accidents have occurred due to reckless car drivers, then the assumption holds no merit.
Lastly, the author assumes that helmets do not contribute to safety. The author provides evidence that despite the increase in helmet usage, 200% of accidents have increased. However, the evidence is not substantial enough to support that helmets do not provide safety. While accidents may occur, it could be that the helmets are protecting individuals from having severe concussions and brain damage. The author does not provide evidence stating whether or not accidents have led to severe medical injuries. If injuries still remain, then helmets serve no purpose. However, if accidents happened, but injuries were minor due to the helmet usage, then the author’s assumption is unwarranted.
Furthermore, the author argues that education on bike safety is required in order to reduce the number of accidents. However, the unaddressed assumptions would not support the claim. The author must provide evidence, such as data, reports, and surveys that indicate whether increase in helmet usage served no purpose in safety and accidents. If not, then the argument would be faulty.
Comments
e-rater score report
duplicated arguments
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Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.0 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 31 15
No. of Words: 503 350
No. of Characters: 2565 1500
No. of Different Words: 173 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.736 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.099 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.544 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 216 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 153 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 90 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 51 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 16.226 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 5.598 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.742 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.326 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.326 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.069 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 1 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 4, column 448, Rule ID: WHETHER[7]
Message: Perhaps you can shorten this phrase to just 'whether'. It is correct though if you mean 'regardless of whether'.
Suggestion: whether
...uthor does not provide evidence stating whether or not accidents have led to severe medical in...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, first, firstly, furthermore, however, if, lastly, may, second, secondly, so, still, then, therefore, while, such as
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 23.0 19.6327345309 117% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 15.0 12.9520958084 116% => OK
Conjunction : 7.0 11.1786427146 63% => OK
Relative clauses : 17.0 13.6137724551 125% => OK
Pronoun: 19.0 28.8173652695 66% => OK
Preposition: 42.0 55.5748502994 76% => OK
Nominalization: 27.0 16.3942115768 165% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2651.0 2260.96107784 117% => OK
No of words: 503.0 441.139720559 114% => OK
Chars per words: 5.2703777336 5.12650576532 103% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.73578520332 4.56307096286 104% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.64964522528 2.78398813304 95% => OK
Unique words: 189.0 204.123752495 93% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.375745526839 0.468620217663 80% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 841.5 705.55239521 119% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 2.0 4.96107784431 40% => OK
Article: 21.0 8.76447105788 240% => Less articles wanted as sentence beginning.
Subordination: 10.0 2.70958083832 369% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 2.0 4.22255489022 47% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 31.0 19.7664670659 157% => OK
Sentence length: 16.0 22.8473053892 70% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 33.6046364672 57.8364921388 58% => The essay contains lots of sentences with the similar length. More sentence varieties wanted.
Chars per sentence: 85.5161290323 119.503703932 72% => OK
Words per sentence: 16.2258064516 23.324526521 70% => OK
Discourse Markers: 3.87096774194 5.70786347227 68% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 4.0 8.20758483034 49% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 20.0 6.88822355289 290% => Less negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 7.0 4.67664670659 150% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.185840235993 0.218282227539 85% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0558299543528 0.0743258471296 75% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0563025027228 0.0701772020484 80% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.104097734656 0.128457276422 81% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0525959353238 0.0628817314937 84% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 11.5 14.3799401198 80% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 46.78 48.3550499002 97% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.7 12.197005988 88% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.99 12.5979740519 103% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.73 8.32208582834 93% => OK
difficult_words: 105.0 98.500998004 107% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 8.0 12.3882235529 65% => OK
gunning_fog: 8.4 11.1389221557 75% => OK
text_standard: 8.0 11.9071856287 67% => The average readability is low. Need to imporve the language.
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 50.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.0 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.