A recent study by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention found that employees with paid sick leave
are 28 percent less likely to be involved in a work-related accident than employees who do not receive
payment for sick leave. Researchers hypothesize that employees with unpaid sick leave feel pressured to
work during time of illness for fear of lack of pay. On-the-job accidents are then spurred by impairedjudgment or motor skills due to illness or illness-related medications. The highest-risk occupations, such
as construction, showed the highest discrepancy between paid and unpaid leave.
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be answered in order to determine
whether the researchers’ hypothesis is reasonable. Be sure to explain what effects the answers to these
questions would have on the validity of the hypothesis.
The argument claims that employees with unpaid sick leave tend to have more work-related accidents compared to the ones with paid sick leave, due to the fact that they are forced to attend to work even if they aren't physically fit to carry their jobs. This hypothesis is not entirely convincing as there are a few more aspects that should be considered as well as more questions to be answered to make it reasonable.
Firstly, the researchers assume that employees with unpaid sick leave are all of the low-wage incomes, and therefore fear the lack of pay. The argument did not mention what job positions they have specifically carried that research on. So one of the most important questions to be answered is: What is the average income of the employees this research was based on? Meaning that it needs to be clarified which class of workers was this data based on. Were they all low-income? Were some of them high-income? It should be born in mind that people with higher income might feel indifferent regarding the deducted amount from their paycheck after taking unpaid sick leave. While, on the other hand, every penny counts at the end of the month for those with a lower income. The researchers did not elaborate on this and thus it deems their argument unreasonable until the sufficient data is provided.
In addition, the nature of the jobs included in the research were not mentioned, not all job environments are actually vulnerable for on-job accidents. For example, construction is indeed a risky work environment that is definitely prone to casual on-job accidents, but in environments like corporate offices, it is very hard to actually get harmed by anything in the surroundings. As a supporting example, it is known that there is a huge gap between the risk factors in the workplace of a mechanic compared to a receptionist. So, the second question to be asked is: what are the natures of the work environment of these employees? With this piece of information being considered while collecting the data for this research, and consequently represented, a more solid and reasonable hypothesis would have resulted. As without knowing the type of appliances or objects surrounding these people on a daily basis, it will be difficult to assess the risk factors and therefore to assess the probability of actually having a work-related accident.
The hypothesis might have been strengthened if the researchers added two more sets of data to it. First, the average income of the employees included in the study and the nature of the environment they work in. When both of these are considered, a more reliable and firm hypothesis will emerge.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.0 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 20 15
No. of Words: 448 350
No. of Characters: 2167 1500
No. of Different Words: 217 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.601 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.837 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.782 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 140 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 109 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 90 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 62 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 22.4 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.79 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.7 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.286 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.461 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.058 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 4 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 211, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: aren't
...e forced to attend to work even if they arent physically fit to carry their jobs. Thi...
^^^^^
Line 5, column 75, Rule ID: ALL_OF_THE[1]
Message: Simply use 'all the'.
Suggestion: all the
...at employees with unpaid sick leave are all of the low-wage incomes, and therefore fear th...
^^^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, but, consequently, first, firstly, if, regarding, second, so, then, therefore, thus, well, while, for example, in addition, as well as, on the other hand
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 30.0 19.6327345309 153% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 7.0 12.9520958084 54% => OK
Conjunction : 9.0 11.1786427146 81% => OK
Relative clauses : 11.0 13.6137724551 81% => OK
Pronoun: 36.0 28.8173652695 125% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 66.0 55.5748502994 119% => OK
Nominalization: 11.0 16.3942115768 67% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2227.0 2260.96107784 98% => OK
No of words: 447.0 441.139720559 101% => OK
Chars per words: 4.98210290828 5.12650576532 97% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.59808378696 4.56307096286 101% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.84228165909 2.78398813304 102% => OK
Unique words: 223.0 204.123752495 109% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.498881431767 0.468620217663 106% => OK
syllable_count: 702.0 705.55239521 99% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 5.0 4.96107784431 101% => OK
Article: 10.0 8.76447105788 114% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 3.0 1.67365269461 179% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 4.22255489022 71% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 20.0 19.7664670659 101% => OK
Sentence length: 22.0 22.8473053892 96% => OK
Sentence length SD: 58.7028747167 57.8364921388 101% => OK
Chars per sentence: 111.35 119.503703932 93% => OK
Words per sentence: 22.35 23.324526521 96% => OK
Discourse Markers: 8.15 5.70786347227 143% => OK
Paragraphs: 4.0 5.15768463074 78% => More paragraphs wanted.
Language errors: 2.0 5.25449101796 38% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 5.0 8.20758483034 61% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 9.0 6.88822355289 131% => OK
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: 0.227062555323 0.218282227539 104% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0621622057434 0.0743258471296 84% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0553555912659 0.0701772020484 79% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.139300760924 0.128457276422 108% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0441980245113 0.0628817314937 70% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.2 14.3799401198 92% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 49.15 48.3550499002 102% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.9 12.197005988 98% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.9 12.5979740519 94% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.22 8.32208582834 99% => OK
difficult_words: 99.0 98.500998004 101% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.8 11.1389221557 97% => OK
text_standard: 12.0 11.9071856287 101% => 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.