A recent survey of 250 adults between the ages of 30 and 45 showed an association between the number of hours adults spend online each day and self-reporting of symptoms commonly associated with depression. The survey found that adults who spend 30 hours or more online each week were twice as likely as others to report that they "frequently" had trouble concentrating. Of adults who reported spending more than 30 hours per week online, 20% also reported that they had felt "sad, down, or blue" at least three times within the past month.
The argument is based on several fallacious assumptions and fails to provide substantive evidences to support them. It unwarrantingly assumes that a survey done for only a small group of people applies the result to everyone and summarilly disregards other important factors such as the self-reporting fact of the survey and differences between concentration problem and outright depression all of which is based on vague or ambiguous reasonings.
First of all, the survey is done for only a small group of people numbering 250 that only includes adults between 30 and 45. The number 250 by itself is very small to substantiate a claim of this grandiosity. One might ask, does just one survey on a small contingent of people prove its credibility for everyone. Even when this question is answered, we again need to know what percent of total population this 30 to 45 -year aged people consist of. If it is a very small number then the results of the survey remains questionable. If the survey can provide resonable answers to these questions, the truth to the link between online usage and depression may be more verifyable.
Secondly, the survey takes account of people who self-reported. Looking at the very small number of people on whom the survey was done, this number could be a very small fragment of an already small number itself. Furthermore, another question comes to mind. Which group of the people did the reporting? Maybe the people who used the internent more frequently were expansive by nature and only they were the ones who did the reporting. Or maybe, the online users who did the reporting are focussed on so many things at once that they have trouble concentrating as they have become accustomed to doing a lot of multitasking. Then it should come as no surprise that the ratio of people who uses online services more frequently is much higher to ones who don't use online services.
Finally, we need to keep in ming that concentration problem and depression are not the same thing. Also, the author says that those who reported had "frequent" concentration problems, but not "always", which can relate to the tasks they were performing during that time and have nothing to do with who uses online and who don't. Likewise, 20 percent of the people felt that they were depressed said that they were depressed during the last 3 months. We need to ask, did something unrelated to the internet happened that was the cause of depression? Or, were they depressed more frequently because they surfed the internet more often and came across depressing new more often? Again the responses of the 20 percent of only 250 people is a very small number to justify answers to all of these questions and thus far more evidences are required to substantiate the author's position.
In conclusion, the argument makes several unattended assumptions about the number of people surveyed, their proportion of age among all people and the relation between concentration problem and depression and untill further evidences are provided, these assumptions severely undermine the argument presented.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Sentence: It unwarrantingly assumes that a survey done for only a small group of people applies the result to everyone and summarilly disregards other important factors such as the self-reporting fact of the survey and differences between concentration problem and outright depression all of which is based on vague or ambiguous reasonings.
Error: summarilly Suggestion: summarily
Sentence: If the survey can provide resonable answers to these questions, the truth to the link between online usage and depression may be more verifyable.
Error: resonable Suggestion: No alternate word
Error: verifyable Suggestion: verifiable
Sentence: Maybe the people who used the internent more frequently were expansive by nature and only they were the ones who did the reporting.
Error: internent Suggestion: internet
Sentence: Finally, we need to keep in ming that concentration problem and depression are not the same thing.
Error: ming Suggestion: No alternate word
Sentence: In conclusion, the argument makes several unattended assumptions about the number of people surveyed, their proportion of age among all people and the relation between concentration problem and depression and untill further evidences are provided, these assumptions severely undermine the argument presented.
Error: untill Suggestion: until
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argument 1 -- OK
argument 2 -- OK
argument 3 -- OK
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Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.5 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 6 2
No. of Sentences: 21 15
No. of Words: 518 350
No. of Characters: 2530 1500
No. of Different Words: 243 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.771 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.884 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.717 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 177 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 126 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 93 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 63 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 24.667 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 13.534 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.571 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.32 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.512 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.124 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 450, Rule ID: SENTENCE_FRAGMENT[1]
Message: “If” at the beginning of a sentence requires a 2nd clause. Maybe a comma, question or exclamation mark is missing, or the sentence is incomplete and should be joined with the following sentence.
... 30 to 45 -year aged people consist of. If it is a very small number then the resu...
^^
Line 5, column 753, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: don't
...e frequently is much higher to ones who dont use online services. Finally, we nee...
^^^^
Line 7, column 343, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: don't
...hing to do with who uses online and who dont. Likewise, 20 percent of the people fel...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, finally, first, furthermore, if, likewise, look, may, second, secondly, so, then, thus, in conclusion, such as, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 22.0 19.6327345309 112% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 9.0 12.9520958084 69% => OK
Conjunction : 18.0 11.1786427146 161% => OK
Relative clauses : 24.0 13.6137724551 176% => OK
Pronoun: 37.0 28.8173652695 128% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 63.0 55.5748502994 113% => OK
Nominalization: 14.0 16.3942115768 85% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2612.0 2260.96107784 116% => OK
No of words: 516.0 441.139720559 117% => OK
Chars per words: 5.06201550388 5.12650576532 99% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.76609204519 4.56307096286 104% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.91933548608 2.78398813304 105% => OK
Unique words: 247.0 204.123752495 121% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.478682170543 0.468620217663 102% => OK
syllable_count: 810.9 705.55239521 115% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 7.0 4.96107784431 141% => OK
Article: 8.0 8.76447105788 91% => OK
Subordination: 2.0 2.70958083832 74% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 1.0 4.22255489022 24% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 22.0 19.7664670659 111% => OK
Sentence length: 23.0 22.8473053892 101% => OK
Sentence length SD: 73.8576920685 57.8364921388 128% => OK
Chars per sentence: 118.727272727 119.503703932 99% => OK
Words per sentence: 23.4545454545 23.324526521 101% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.13636363636 5.70786347227 108% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 3.0 5.25449101796 57% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 3.0 8.20758483034 37% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 12.0 6.88822355289 174% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 7.0 4.67664670659 150% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.168250061225 0.218282227539 77% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0537102512348 0.0743258471296 72% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0547280232425 0.0701772020484 78% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0990539505776 0.128457276422 77% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.060034576621 0.0628817314937 95% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.1 14.3799401198 98% => 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: 12.36 12.5979740519 98% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.08 8.32208582834 97% => OK
difficult_words: 108.0 98.500998004 110% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.2 11.1389221557 101% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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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.