The argument claims that levels of stimulation of an individual are affected by birth order. Stated in this way the argument: reveals examples of leap of faith, poor reasoning and ill-defined terminology and fails to mention several key factors, on the basis of which it could be evaluated. The conclusion of the argument relies on assumptions for which there is no clear evidence. Hence, the argument is unconvincing and has several flaws.
First, the argument readily state that firstborn baby rhesus monkeys produce up to two times as much of the hormone cortisol as do their younger siblings in stimulating situations. This statement is a stretch since the author compares the amount of hormone cortisol between old and young monkeys. Suppose, for example, the firstborn monkeys produce more hormone since they are older and more mature. Clearly, the cause of this phenomenon could lie in the age group but not in birth order. The argument could have been much more cogent if it explicitly showed that the quantity of hormone cortisol between monkeys that have different birth order and similar age group.
Second, the argument claims that firstborn humans also produce relatively high levels of cortisol in stimulating situations. This is again a very hasty and unconvincing claim as the observation of analogous phenomenon needs to be examined carefully. Although humans and rhesus monkeys share many similar attributes, they could express differently. To illustrate, the observed behavior in humans might be the result of communication between parents and children; obviously, monkeys lack this ability. Therefore, the author could be too reckless when concluding the correlation between birth order and levels of stimulation.
Finally, the author also mentions that first-time mother monkeys have higher levels of cortisol than experienced mother. Could the firstborn monkeys produce much more hormone cortisol than their siblings due to the high levels of cortisol of first-time mother monkeys? Did the author find out which causes affect levels of cortisol of first-time mother monkeys during pregnancy? Without convincing answer to these questions, one is left with the impression that the claim is more of wishful thinking rather than substantive evidence.
In conclusion, the argument is flawed for the above-mentioned reasons and is therefore unconvincing. It could be considerably strengthened if the author clearly mentioned all the relevant facts to support the conclusion that the effects of birth order on an individual’s levels of stimulation.
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: ??? out of 6
Category: Poor Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 20 15
No. of Words: 397 350
No. of Characters: 2126 1500
No. of Different Words: 192 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.464 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.355 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.763 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 172 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 134 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 88 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 55 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 19.85 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 6.215 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.5 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.342 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.566 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.116 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, finally, first, hence, if, second, so, then, therefore, for example, in conclusion
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 16.0 19.6327345309 81% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 8.0 12.9520958084 62% => OK
Conjunction : 12.0 11.1786427146 107% => OK
Relative clauses : 12.0 13.6137724551 88% => OK
Pronoun: 21.0 28.8173652695 73% => OK
Preposition: 52.0 55.5748502994 94% => OK
Nominalization: 18.0 16.3942115768 110% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2186.0 2260.96107784 97% => OK
No of words: 397.0 441.139720559 90% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.50629722922 5.12650576532 107% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.46372701284 4.56307096286 98% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.89994564193 2.78398813304 104% => OK
Unique words: 195.0 204.123752495 96% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.491183879093 0.468620217663 105% => OK
syllable_count: 666.0 705.55239521 94% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 4.0 4.96107784431 81% => OK
Article: 12.0 8.76447105788 137% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 2.70958083832 37% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 4.0 4.22255489022 95% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 20.0 19.7664670659 101% => OK
Sentence length: 19.0 22.8473053892 83% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 37.8178198737 57.8364921388 65% => OK
Chars per sentence: 109.3 119.503703932 91% => OK
Words per sentence: 19.85 23.324526521 85% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.65 5.70786347227 81% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 5.25449101796 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 9.0 8.20758483034 110% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 4.0 4.67664670659 86% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.152973291497 0.218282227539 70% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0543333251287 0.0743258471296 73% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0662148371894 0.0701772020484 94% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0972239349213 0.128457276422 76% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0396274263942 0.0628817314937 63% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.4 14.3799401198 100% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 43.73 48.3550499002 90% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.9 12.197005988 98% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.68 12.5979740519 117% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.76 8.32208582834 105% => OK
difficult_words: 105.0 98.500998004 107% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.5 12.3882235529 93% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.6 11.1389221557 86% => OK
text_standard: 12.0 11.9071856287 101% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 Out of 6
---------------------
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.