The following report appeared in the newsletter of the West Meria Public
Health Council.
"An innovative treatment has come to our attention that promises to
significantly reduce absenteeism in our schools and workplaces. A study
reports that in nearby East Meria, where fish consumption is very high,
people visit the doctor only once or twice per year for the treatment of
colds. Clearly, eating a substantial amount of fish can prevent colds. Since
colds represent the most frequently given reason for absences from school
and work, we recommend the daily use of Ichthaid - a nutritional
supplement derived from fish oil - as a good way to prevent colds and lower
absenteeism."
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
The author of the report recommends using, each day, a nutritional supplement derived from fish oil in order to decrease colds and consequently absent rates from schools and work. To justify his recommendation, the author uses the results of a study conducted in nearby East Meria where consume fish and they have lower rates of visiting the doctors for colds. The author makes some unwarranted assumptions that render the report highly suspected. He should consider some solid pieces of evidence to make his recommendation more convincing.
First of all, the author assumes that because the most frequently reason for students and employees’ absences is colds, they should come up with a treatment for colds in West Maria. What if colds is just an excuse made by students and workers for their absences from schools and workplace? There is no convincing evidence in the report which shows students and employees’ honesty. If this proves that they have other reason for their absences than colds, the author’s recommendation won’t affect the absenteeism rate in West Maria.
Moreover, it’s not persuasive that the author compares two different regions, East Maria and West Maria, without precise information about these two regions demographics. To have a better comparison the author must consider the population of these two regions as well as their weather conditions. If East Maria is warmer than West Maria, it would decrease the rate of colds for the residents of East Maria. Knowing the population of these two areas gives the reader better vision about the validity of the argument. If it proves that the number of the total East Maria’ population is less than West Maria’s, then it should be considered that the ratio of people who may catch a cold, with other same factors, in East Maria would be less than West Maria. Without considering these pieces of evidence about the two parts of Maria, the author fails to convince the reader.
Finally, the low rate of visiting the doctors, which was reported in a study, is not necessarily meaning that they had fewer colds. It’s possible that most of the hospitals and doctors, in East Maria, had announced that no longer accept colds disease, as it can cure easily by individuals at their homes. In this case, this piece of evidence mentioned in the argument is invalid. Therefore, the author should examine more accurate the reason of lower rates of visiting doctors for colds, in East Maria, to have a more solid recommendation.
All in all, the argument, as it stands now, is flawed due the lack of concrete evidence. To be able to write a more convincing report and recommendation, the author should take more evidence into account. Perhaps, a systematic study with accurate statistics would help the author to have a solid argument.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 9 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 4 2
No. of Sentences: 21 15
No. of Words: 467 350
No. of Characters: 2272 1500
No. of Different Words: 203 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.649 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.865 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.547 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 151 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 106 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 75 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 42 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 22.238 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.708 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.476 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.34 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.34 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.076 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 1 5
Transition Words or Phrases used:
consequently, finally, first, if, may, moreover, so, then, therefore, well, as well as, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 12.0 19.6327345309 61% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 11.0 12.9520958084 85% => OK
Conjunction : 10.0 11.1786427146 89% => OK
Relative clauses : 13.0 13.6137724551 95% => OK
Pronoun: 34.0 28.8173652695 118% => OK
Preposition: 58.0 55.5748502994 104% => OK
Nominalization: 21.0 16.3942115768 128% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2349.0 2260.96107784 104% => OK
No of words: 466.0 441.139720559 106% => OK
Chars per words: 5.04077253219 5.12650576532 98% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.64618479453 4.56307096286 102% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.68473117885 2.78398813304 96% => OK
Unique words: 212.0 204.123752495 104% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.454935622318 0.468620217663 97% => OK
syllable_count: 719.1 705.55239521 102% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 6.0 4.96107784431 121% => OK
Article: 12.0 8.76447105788 137% => OK
Subordination: 5.0 2.70958083832 185% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 11.0 4.22255489022 261% => Less preposition wanted as sentence beginnings.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 21.0 19.7664670659 106% => OK
Sentence length: 22.0 22.8473053892 96% => OK
Sentence length SD: 42.2932747424 57.8364921388 73% => OK
Chars per sentence: 111.857142857 119.503703932 94% => OK
Words per sentence: 22.1904761905 23.324526521 95% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.7619047619 5.70786347227 83% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 5.25449101796 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 11.0 8.20758483034 134% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 3.0 4.67664670659 64% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.112297120168 0.218282227539 51% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0374563618035 0.0743258471296 50% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.028548838173 0.0701772020484 41% => Sentences are similar to each other.
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0678639520877 0.128457276422 53% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0268061499064 0.0628817314937 43% => 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: 13.4 14.3799401198 93% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 57.61 48.3550499002 119% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.7 12.197005988 88% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.95 12.5979740519 95% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.29 8.32208582834 100% => OK
difficult_words: 105.0 98.500998004 107% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.8 11.1389221557 97% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 58.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.5 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.