The following appeared on the Website Science News Today.
"In a recent survey of more than 5,000 adolescents, the teens who reported eating the most meals with their families were the least likely to use illegal drugs, tobacco, or alcohol. Family meals were also associated with higher grades, better self-esteem, and lower rates of depression. Almost 30 percent of the teens said they ate at least seven meals per week with their families. Clearly, having a high number of family meals keeps teens from engaging in bad behaviors."
The argument presented on website science news conclude that higher frequency of meal with family will lead teens to be less involve in illegal activities. The author supports the argument with these three assumptions, if not substantiated, dramatically weaken the above evaluation.
Firstly, isn’t it possible to be involved in illegal activities and eat dinner with the family at the same time? Author assumption that teens who are not having illegal drugs when eating meals with family is not convincing because they might eat illegal things before or after coming to the house for meal. There is also possibility that they hide the alcohol, drugs or tobacco at their room and after having meal with their family together they come to their room and eat those illegal things. If any of the above situation is true, author conclusion does not hold water.
Also, isn’t it possible that those who stay in hostel get higher grades? Author assumes that teens who eat with their family get higher grades and have better self esteem but students who live in hostel far away from their family can also get good grades and not involve in consumption of illegal items. Perhaps, an orphan who doesn’t have their family and never has meal with their family can be great at their grades and not consume alcohol, drugs or/and tobacco. If any of the assumption is true the author claim is not warranted.
Lastly, isn’t it possible that the teens who said they don’t use illegal drugs, alcohol or/and drugs are telling lies? There is a possibility that teens who came for the survey had to respond to the question in front of their parents so they instead of getting into trouble lied about the question. Maybe teens forms were filled or transported to the survey station by parents their parents so to hide their innocence they did not answer the question honestly. If any of the situation holds true the author assertion is considered flawed.
The author argument must be carefully reassessed because the teens might be involved in illegal activities even though they eat meal with their family. Therefore, the student’s truthfulness and information specifically about those who stay away from their families must be individually relooked upon to make author’s conclusion more promising.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 9 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 7 2
No. of Sentences: 16 15
No. of Words: 387 350
No. of Characters: 1859 1500
No. of Different Words: 174 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.435 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.804 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.398 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 128 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 84 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 52 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 33 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 24.188 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 8.225 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.75 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.367 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.367 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.107 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 1 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 466, Rule ID: SENTENCE_FRAGMENT[1]
Message: “If” at the beginning of a sentence requires a 2nd clause. Maybe a comma, question or exclamation mark is missing, or the sentence is incomplete and should be joined with the following sentence.
... consume alcohol, drugs or/and tobacco. If any of the assumption is true the autho...
^^^
Line 4, column 461, Rule ID: SENTENCE_FRAGMENT[1]
Message: “If” at the beginning of a sentence requires a 2nd clause. Maybe a comma, question or exclamation mark is missing, or the sentence is incomplete and should be joined with the following sentence.
...y did not answer the question honestly. If any of the situation holds true the aut...
^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, firstly, honestly, if, lastly, look, may, so, therefore
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 16.0 19.6327345309 81% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 7.0 12.9520958084 54% => OK
Conjunction : 16.0 11.1786427146 143% => OK
Relative clauses : 16.0 13.6137724551 118% => OK
Pronoun: 34.0 28.8173652695 118% => OK
Preposition: 47.0 55.5748502994 85% => OK
Nominalization: 17.0 16.3942115768 104% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1917.0 2260.96107784 85% => OK
No of words: 380.0 441.139720559 86% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.04473684211 5.12650576532 98% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.41515443553 4.56307096286 97% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.47028181465 2.78398813304 89% => OK
Unique words: 181.0 204.123752495 89% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.476315789474 0.468620217663 102% => OK
syllable_count: 582.3 705.55239521 83% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 0.0 4.96107784431 0% => OK
Article: 5.0 8.76447105788 57% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 2.70958083832 148% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 0.0 4.22255489022 0% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 16.0 19.7664670659 81% => Need more sentences. Double check the format of sentences, make sure there is a space between two sentences, or have enough periods. And also check the lengths of sentences, maybe they are too long.
Sentence length: 23.0 22.8473053892 101% => OK
Sentence length SD: 48.5662804191 57.8364921388 84% => OK
Chars per sentence: 119.8125 119.503703932 100% => OK
Words per sentence: 23.75 23.324526521 102% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.5625 5.70786347227 80% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 2.0 5.25449101796 38% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 8.0 8.20758483034 97% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 1.0 4.67664670659 21% => More facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.344330448154 0.218282227539 158% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.118520785162 0.0743258471296 159% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0916923499892 0.0701772020484 131% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.199832843418 0.128457276422 156% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0516790300185 0.0628817314937 82% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.2 14.3799401198 99% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 56.59 48.3550499002 117% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.1 12.197005988 91% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.25 12.5979740519 97% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.6 8.32208582834 91% => OK
difficult_words: 68.0 98.500998004 69% => More difficult words wanted.
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.2 11.1389221557 101% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
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.