"A recent study of eighteen rhesus monkeys provides clues as to the effects of birth order on an individual's levels of stimulation. The study showed that in stimulating situations (such as an encounter with an unfamiliar monkey), firstborn infant monkeys produce up to twice as much of the hormone cortisol, which primes the body for increased activity levels, as do their younger siblings. Firstborn humans also produce relatively high levels of cortisol in stimulating situations (such as the return of a parent after an absence). The study also found that during pregnancy, first-time mother monkeys had higher levels of cortisol than did those who had had several offspring."
Write a response in which you discuss one or more alternative explanations that could rival the proposed explanation and explain how your explanation(s) can plausibly account for the facts presented in the argument.
The above argument implies greater level of stimulation for first born individuals based on a study on monkeys. While such may very well be the case, however, due to the lack of sufficient evidence provided in the argument we can not arrive to such a conclusion.
The conclusion of the argument is derived from a study of just eighteen monkeys. The number is too low to give such an expansive conclusion. And of course the study is carried out on monkeys, while human’s and monkey’s have a lot of similarity, it does not necessarily mean that is particular condition will hold true for both oragnism.
First born monkeys are shown to have greater stimulation, however, since this monkeys are infants it could be a very likely scenario that the youger monkeys that were under test were far younger to understand the need for stimulation. For example a human baby of 2 months old can be carried by any individual as they lack the intelligence to differentiate between human beings, however a one year old human baby will definitely cry out when faced with an unknown individual. The above study does not provide sufficient evidence to prove that the younger sibilings were simply not mature enough to respond.
The argument sites only one interaction of first born humans to arrive to the conclusion of stimulation. But stimulating situation is not just about meeting your parents after an absence, it encompases mnay other things such as changes in environment, meeting new individuals and many more. So the argument needs to refer to more such scenarios.
The greater level of cortisol found in first time mothers could be the result of mother’s unfamiliarity when dealing with pregnancy, but that does not necessarily imply that such hormones gets passed down to the offspring. The author does not provide any evidence for that.
And lastly, the authors rests his entire argument on stimulation being dependent on hormone cortisol, but stimulation could be dependent on other chemicals as well. Cortisols may not be the only determing factor.
The increased stimulation of eighteen infant monkeys, and first born individuals swayed the author to believe in increased stimulation in first born. However, the small sample, lack of sufficient variety of stimuating conditions, lack of evidence between similarities of humans and monkeys and using just hormone cortisol as the only reference for stimulations makes the conclusion debatable.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
samples:
https://www.testbig.com/story/gre-argument-essay-topic-2-outline
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Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: ??? out of 6
Category: Poor Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 17 15
No. of Words: 398 350
No. of Characters: 2001 1500
No. of Different Words: 191 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.467 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.028 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.739 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 141 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 117 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 75 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 54 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 23.412 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 10.831 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.765 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.322 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.64 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.044 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 7 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 5, column 74, Rule ID: THIS_NNS[1]
Message: Did you mean 'these'?
Suggestion: these
...ave greater stimulation, however, since this monkeys are infants it could be a very ...
^^^^
Line 5, column 389, Rule ID: EN_COMPOUNDS
Message: This word is normally spelled with hyphen.
Suggestion: one-year-old
...entiate between human beings, however a one year old human baby will definitely cry out when...
^^^^^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, first, however, if, lastly, may, so, well, while, for example, of course, such as
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 17.0 19.6327345309 87% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 10.0 12.9520958084 77% => OK
Conjunction : 10.0 11.1786427146 89% => OK
Relative clauses : 9.0 13.6137724551 66% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 15.0 28.8173652695 52% => OK
Preposition: 56.0 55.5748502994 101% => OK
Nominalization: 25.0 16.3942115768 152% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2075.0 2260.96107784 92% => OK
No of words: 398.0 441.139720559 90% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.2135678392 5.12650576532 102% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.46653527281 4.56307096286 98% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.8978651685 2.78398813304 104% => OK
Unique words: 196.0 204.123752495 96% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.492462311558 0.468620217663 105% => OK
syllable_count: 650.7 705.55239521 92% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 2.0 4.96107784431 40% => OK
Article: 10.0 8.76447105788 114% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 6.0 1.67365269461 358% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 1.0 4.22255489022 24% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 17.0 19.7664670659 86% => OK
Sentence length: 23.0 22.8473053892 101% => OK
Sentence length SD: 68.6049823163 57.8364921388 119% => OK
Chars per sentence: 122.058823529 119.503703932 102% => OK
Words per sentence: 23.4117647059 23.324526521 100% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.05882352941 5.70786347227 89% => OK
Paragraphs: 7.0 5.15768463074 136% => Less paragraphs wanted.
Language errors: 2.0 5.25449101796 38% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 7.0 8.20758483034 85% => 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: 0.218479552396 0.218282227539 100% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0693820110484 0.0743258471296 93% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0388701102129 0.0701772020484 55% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.105729022648 0.128457276422 82% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0432754940769 0.0628817314937 69% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.8 14.3799401198 103% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 48.13 48.3550499002 100% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.3 12.197005988 101% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.23 12.5979740519 105% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.43 8.32208582834 101% => OK
difficult_words: 92.0 98.500998004 93% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.2 11.1389221557 101% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Maximum six paragraphs wanted.
Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 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.