The following report appeared in the newsletter of GoldenAge Independent and Assisted Living Facilities for Seniors.
"A novel therapy has come to our attention that promises to significantly decrease the incidence of dementia in our aging community. According to a 21-year study led by the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and funded by the National Institute on Aging, while many physical activities like playing tennis or golf, swimming, bicycling, dancing, and walking for exercise provided cardiovascular benefits for seniors, only one physical activity offered protection against dementia: that was frequent dancing. At GoldenAge we currently provide residents with extensive recreational facilities. These include tennis courts, a fitness center, and lap pools in each senior apartment complex. However, we have no dance studio space at GoldenAge, nor any social dance programs.
Clearly, social dancing can prevent or delay the onset of dementia. Since the onset of dementia inevitably signals the imminent move of residents from our independent living apartments to the more heavily staffed and therefore more costly to operate assisted living quarters, we recommend the establishment of social dance programs at all GoldenAge senior residences—as a cost-effective, positive way to ward off dementia and enable our residents to remain in their independent living quarters."
Respond by writing an essay in which you discuss the specific evidence you would need to judge the validity of the argument and explain how this evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.
The author puts fortha an argument in which he recommends the establishment of social dance programs at all GoldenAge senior residences - as a cost effective and positive way to ward off dementia. He makes this recommendation on the basis of the 21-year study led by the Albert Einstein College of Medicine funded by the National Institute on Aging. Although the author's heart might be in the right place, the argument put forth by the author appears to be specious and can be very easily proven false if specific evidence is not provided. The following points will give a better idea of what this evidence is.
The author has made the recommendation on the basis of a 21-year study led by the Albert Einstein College of Medicine funded by the National Institute on Aging. The study states that while many physical activities provided cardiovascular benefits, only one physical activity offered protection against dementia: that was frequent dancing. But the author fails to provide any kind of statistical evidence of this study which can prove that a good deal of people can be prevented from dementia by frequent dancing. Statistical facts like what percentage of people can prevent or delay dementia by frequent dancing are missing from the argument. If the success rate of this study is really good, then obviously the study will prove to be a benefit, but if not and although the facts are true that frequent dancing can prevent or delay dementia but the chances of that happening are only one in a thousand, then the feasibility of this recommendation should also be taken into consideration. The author has also failed to provide any references to the implementation of this study and if it proved successful or not.
Secondly, the author has not provided any evidence that the residents at GoldenAge have an affinity for regular dancing. No one can force anyone to do anything. And so if the residents of GoldenAge do not like to dance on a regular basis then the establishment of social dance programs will prove useless. Apart from that, not every one of the seniors residing at GoldenAge will have a possibility of getting dementia and without any evidence from family history or medical indicators of dementia, the total number of people who are susceptible to dementia out of all the residents at GoldenAge is also nowhere mentioned. Without this information, we cannot determine the necessity of establishing social dance programs and hence this also puts the feasibility of the dance programs into question.
Furthermore, the author has not provided any information about the seniors residing at GoldenAge. Even if the people who were susceptible to dementia were high and the study was also feasible, we have to consider that dancing is a physical activity that all the seniors may not be able to perform. Seniors who can, unfortunately, no longer walk or move about, or are on complete bedrest will naturally not be participating in the social dancing. Without the knowledge of the number of residents at GoldenAge that are fit to dance, the dance program may or may not prove feasible.
In conclusion, the author's recommendation is definitely for a good cause but the author has not provided enough evidence to determine that the recommendation is cogent.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 9 2
No. of Sentences: 20 15
No. of Words: 546 350
No. of Characters: 2688 1500
No. of Different Words: 214 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.834 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.923 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.809 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 196 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 157 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 118 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 57 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 27.3 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 11.984 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.65 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.34 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.54 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.112 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 364, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...tional Institute on Aging. Although the authors heart might be in the right place, the ...
^^^^^^^
Line 3, column 162, Rule ID: ENGLISH_WORD_REPEAT_BEGINNING_RULE
Message: Three successive sentences begin with the same word. Reword the sentence or use a thesaurus to find a synonym.
...ded by the National Institute on Aging. The study states that while many physical a...
^^^
Line 9, column 20, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...t prove feasible. In conclusion, the authors recommendation is definitely for a good...
^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, furthermore, hence, if, may, really, second, secondly, so, then, while, apart from, in conclusion, kind of
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 25.0 19.6327345309 127% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 18.0 12.9520958084 139% => OK
Conjunction : 19.0 11.1786427146 170% => OK
Relative clauses : 16.0 13.6137724551 118% => OK
Pronoun: 24.0 28.8173652695 83% => OK
Preposition: 78.0 55.5748502994 140% => OK
Nominalization: 22.0 16.3942115768 134% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2740.0 2260.96107784 121% => OK
No of words: 546.0 441.139720559 124% => OK
Chars per words: 5.01831501832 5.12650576532 98% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.83390555256 4.56307096286 106% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.87483527655 2.78398813304 103% => OK
Unique words: 220.0 204.123752495 108% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.40293040293 0.468620217663 86% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 903.6 705.55239521 128% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 3.0 4.96107784431 60% => OK
Article: 11.0 8.76447105788 126% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 4.0 1.67365269461 239% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 4.0 4.22255489022 95% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 20.0 19.7664670659 101% => OK
Sentence length: 27.0 22.8473053892 118% => OK
Sentence length SD: 68.5350093018 57.8364921388 118% => OK
Chars per sentence: 137.0 119.503703932 115% => OK
Words per sentence: 27.3 23.324526521 117% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.85 5.70786347227 102% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 3.0 5.25449101796 57% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 10.0 8.20758483034 122% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 4.0 6.88822355289 58% => More negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 6.0 4.67664670659 128% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.0692142672979 0.218282227539 32% => The similarity between the topic and the content is low.
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0253759853798 0.0743258471296 34% => Sentence topic similarity is low.
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0227060618754 0.0701772020484 32% => Sentences are similar to each other.
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0451341242882 0.128457276422 35% => Maybe some paragraphs are off the topic.
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0186029859083 0.0628817314937 30% => Paragraphs are similar to each other. Some content may get duplicated or it is not exactly right on the topic.
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 15.9 14.3799401198 111% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 35.61 48.3550499002 74% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 15.0 12.197005988 123% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.13 12.5979740519 96% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.19 8.32208582834 98% => OK
difficult_words: 111.0 98.500998004 113% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 13.5 12.3882235529 109% => OK
gunning_fog: 12.8 11.1389221557 115% => OK
text_standard: 13.0 11.9071856287 109% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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It is not exactly right on the topic in the view of e-grader. Maybe there is a wrong essay topic.
Rates: 16.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 1.0 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.