Milk and dairy products are rich in vitamin D and calcium — substances essential for building and maintaining bones. Many people therefore say that a diet rich in dairy products can help prevent osteoporosis, a disease that is linked to both environmental and genetic factors and that causes the bones to weaken significantly with age. But a long-term study of a large number of people found that those who consistently consumed dairy products throughout the years of the study have a higher rate of bone fractures than any other participants in the study. Since bone fractures are symptomatic of osteoporosis, this study result shows that a diet rich in dairy products may actually increase, rather than decrease, the risk of osteoporosis.
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.
This argument discusses whether a diet rich in dairy products can have any effects on the prevention of osteoporosis. After describing the outcome of a long-term study of a large number of people, the author jumps to a conclusion without being supported by sufficient evidence.
In the last sentence in fact, it is claimed that since people from the long-term study who consistently consumed diaries showed a higher rate of bone fractures, then a diet rich in dairy products increases risks of osteoporosis. However, this implication is based on assumptions not sufficiently bolstered.
Firstly, there could be many reasons why the above mentioned people would have had more bone fractures, and none of them might be related to the dairy diet! Bone fractures can be caused by accidental traumas in everyday life, such as falls, bumps and injuries. A diet rich in dairies has nothing to do with any of these possible causes, thus weakening the author’s claim.
Secondly, there is no written information about the health records of the people who participated in the long-term study. Since it is specifically stated that the disease in question is linked to genetic factors, knowing whether the families of the participants had cases of osteoporosis could be a crucial factor in the study. If the majority of people who showed the higher rate of bone fractures had relatives who suffered from this disease, then it would show a probable explanation of those high rates, highlighting the flaws of the argument.
Furthermore, the author does not provide any information about the provenience of the participants. As it is mentioned in the argument, osteoporosis also depends on environmental factors, which could be related to where people live or used to live. If people who reported higher rates of bone fractures used to live in the same region, or in the same environmental conditions, then another plausible explanation for the higher rates would have been found.
In conclusion, the argument proposed by the author is considerably flawed because of its lack of enough evidence and its reliance on unwarranted assumptions.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 6 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 3 2
No. of Sentences: 14 15
No. of Words: 345 350
No. of Characters: 1741 1500
No. of Different Words: 173 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.31 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.046 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.897 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 125 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 99 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 71 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 48 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 24.643 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 8.414 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.786 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.353 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.603 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.06 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 172, Rule ID: LARGE_NUMBER_OF[1]
Message: Specify a number, remove phrase, or simply use 'many' or 'numerous'
Suggestion: many; numerous
...ing the outcome of a long-term study of a large number of people, the author jumps to a conclusio...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, first, firstly, furthermore, however, if, second, secondly, so, then, thus, in conclusion, in fact, such as
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 14.0 19.6327345309 71% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 9.0 12.9520958084 69% => OK
Conjunction : 5.0 11.1786427146 45% => More conjunction wanted.
Relative clauses : 9.0 13.6137724551 66% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 14.0 28.8173652695 49% => OK
Preposition: 56.0 55.5748502994 101% => OK
Nominalization: 16.0 16.3942115768 98% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1796.0 2260.96107784 79% => OK
No of words: 345.0 441.139720559 78% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.20579710145 5.12650576532 102% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.3097767484 4.56307096286 94% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.99538817961 2.78398813304 108% => OK
Unique words: 181.0 204.123752495 89% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.524637681159 0.468620217663 112% => OK
syllable_count: 566.1 705.55239521 80% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 3.0 4.96107784431 60% => OK
Article: 4.0 8.76447105788 46% => OK
Subordination: 5.0 2.70958083832 185% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 4.0 4.22255489022 95% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 13.0 19.7664670659 66% => 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: 26.0 22.8473053892 114% => OK
Sentence length SD: 54.5073688086 57.8364921388 94% => OK
Chars per sentence: 138.153846154 119.503703932 116% => OK
Words per sentence: 26.5384615385 23.324526521 114% => OK
Discourse Markers: 8.69230769231 5.70786347227 152% => OK
Paragraphs: 6.0 5.15768463074 116% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 3.0 8.20758483034 37% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 6.0 6.88822355289 87% => 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: 0.21382105791 0.218282227539 98% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0729989507664 0.0743258471296 98% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0783720666066 0.0701772020484 112% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.106895069751 0.128457276422 83% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0638864886197 0.0628817314937 102% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 16.4 14.3799401198 114% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 45.09 48.3550499002 93% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.4 12.197005988 110% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.23 12.5979740519 105% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.05 8.32208582834 109% => OK
difficult_words: 90.0 98.500998004 91% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 12.4 11.1389221557 111% => OK
text_standard: 13.0 11.9071856287 109% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 54.17 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.25 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.