Over the past two years, the number of shoppers in Central Plaza has been steadily decreasing while the popularity of skateboarding has increased dramatically. Many Central Plaza store owners believe that the decrease in their business is due to the number of skateboard users in the plaza. There has also been a dramatic increase in the amount of litter and vandalism throughout the plaza. Thus, we recommend that the city prohibit skateboarding in Central Plaza. If skateboarding is prohibited here, we predict that business in Central Plaza will return to its previously high levels.
The statement starts with observations of two concurrent trend. One is that the number of shoppers in Central Plaza kept decreasing and the other is that skateboarding became dramatically more popular there. However, the author hastily blamed the skateboard users for the deteoriorating business and concluded that prohibiting skateboarding will recover the business prosperity in Central Plaza. Several significant flaws exist in the author's reasoning and will be discussed below.
First, the author mistook two events happened at the same time for causal relationship. One alternative explanation could be the two observations here were purely coincidental. Even if there might be correlation between dropping business and increasing skateboarders, like the almost empty plaza attracted skateboarders to use it, we could not determine which is the cause and which is the consequence. The author's reasoning is speculative and had no supporting evidence except for overlap in time period of the two events.
Furthermore, the author had the same flaw in attributing the substantial increase in the amount of litter and vandalism to the skate boarders. This could also be coincidence and the author failed to provide any concrete evidence. Besides skateboarders, has there been any other changes in the activities at Central Plaza? The author did not provide comprehensive information to rule out other possible reasons for the surge in littering and vandalism. For example, the disappointing business performance could be due to the economic recession. With more people getting laid off, they wouldn't have enough money to spend on unnecessary goods. The increase in crimes could be also explained by more unemployed and even homeless people.
Finally, the author recommended the city prohibit skateboarding in Central Plaza and argued that it would bring business back, which is unsubstantiated by any data or evidence. As I discussed above, for example, if the cause is the economic downturn in the big picture, then the propose solution would have no effect to turn the situation around. Without understanding the cause of the problem and resort to a policy based on a speculative cause would hurt both the skate boarding lovers and the business. It is extremely likely that without the skateboarding people, there might be fewer customers, who could be their family and friends
From the discussion above, the author failed to provide any supporting evidence for his claims and erroneously connected two concurrent events as causal relationship. Thus the policy being recommended is ungrounded.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 5.0 out of 6
Category: Very Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 21 15
No. of Words: 403 350
No. of Characters: 2157 1500
No. of Different Words: 211 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.48 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.352 4.6
Word Length SD: 3.019 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 160 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 120 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 92 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 65 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 19.19 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.116 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.571 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.297 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.505 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.061 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 58, Rule ID: CD_NN[1]
Message: Possible agreement error. The noun 'trend' seems to be countable, so consider using: 'trends'.
Suggestion: trends
...rts with observations of two concurrent trend. One is that the number of shoppers in ...
^^^^^
Line 5, column 585, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: wouldn't
...With more people getting laid off, they wouldnt have enough money to spend on unnecessa...
^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 276, Rule ID: A_INFINITVE[1]
Message: Probably a wrong construction: a/the + infinitive
...nomic downturn in the big picture, then the propose solution would have no effect to turn t...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 168, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: Thus,
...ncurrent events as causal relationship. Thus the policy being recommended is ungroun...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, besides, but, finally, first, furthermore, however, if, so, then, thus, except for, for example
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 20.0 19.6327345309 102% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 13.0 12.9520958084 100% => OK
Conjunction : 16.0 11.1786427146 143% => OK
Relative clauses : 9.0 13.6137724551 66% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 14.0 28.8173652695 49% => OK
Preposition: 46.0 55.5748502994 83% => OK
Nominalization: 13.0 16.3942115768 79% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2207.0 2260.96107784 98% => OK
No of words: 402.0 441.139720559 91% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.49004975124 5.12650576532 107% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.47771567384 4.56307096286 98% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.08483087545 2.78398813304 111% => OK
Unique words: 213.0 204.123752495 104% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.529850746269 0.468620217663 113% => OK
syllable_count: 695.7 705.55239521 99% => 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: 10.0 8.76447105788 114% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 20.0 19.7664670659 101% => OK
Sentence length: 20.0 22.8473053892 88% => OK
Sentence length SD: 59.5093270001 57.8364921388 103% => OK
Chars per sentence: 110.35 119.503703932 92% => OK
Words per sentence: 20.1 23.324526521 86% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.05 5.70786347227 88% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 4.0 5.25449101796 76% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 9.0 8.20758483034 110% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 6.0 6.88822355289 87% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 5.0 4.67664670659 107% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.19469394031 0.218282227539 89% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.060550785021 0.0743258471296 81% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0912979804791 0.0701772020484 130% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.11319856266 0.128457276422 88% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.097213303432 0.0628817314937 155% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.5 14.3799401198 101% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 42.72 48.3550499002 88% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.3 12.197005988 101% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.56 12.5979740519 116% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.18 8.32208582834 110% => OK
difficult_words: 116.0 98.500998004 118% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 8.0 12.3882235529 65% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.0 11.1389221557 90% => OK
text_standard: 15.0 11.9071856287 126% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 83.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 5.0 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.