"Twenty years ago, Dr. Field, a noted anthropologist, visited the island of Tertia and
concluded from his observations that children in Tertia were reared by an entire village
rather than by their own biological parents. However, my recent interviews with children
living in the group of islands that includes Tertia show that these children spend much more
time talking about their biological parents than about other adults in the village. This
research of mine proves that Dr. Field's conclusion about Tertian village culture is invalid
and thus that the observation-centered approach to studying cultures is invalid as well. The
interview-centered method that my team of graduate students is currently using in Tertia will
establish a much more accurate understanding of child-rearing traditions there and in other
island cultures."
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.
The argument that observation centered approach to studying cultures is invalid and that interview centered approach would establish a more accurate understanding of child-rearing traditions in Tertia and in other island cultures, is based on a lot of assumptions and is flawed at several positions.
The author tells us that Dr Field made several observations which led him to conclude that the children of Tertia were reared by the village people at large instead of their own biological parents. The specific observations on which the conclusion was based are not disclosed to us. If we had clue about what these observations were, we could strengthen or weaken the argument accordingly. If Dr Field would have made a very extensive set of observations spending time on the entire community and noticing the moves and behaviors of children at each point of time and how they were spending their days and their nights, then the author's claim that observation based study was invalid could be definitely weakened. But, if the doctor's observations were based on behavioral patterns of just few children and were generalized to all the children of Tertia, then we could definitely support the author's claim of observation centered approach.
Another aspect is that according the the author, the interviews were conducted for children of a group of islands including Tertia and it was found that they kept talking about biological parents which helped to understand child-rearing traditions more effectively. If we had the evidence of how many children belonging to Tertia were present for the interview and what kind of questions were asked, could we justify the argument. Let us say, if only a few children from Tertia were picked up for an interview or the range of questions asked were not enough to support the stand of child-rearing traditions, the author's argument about the interview centered approach would turn out to be wrong. But, if it was the case where a lot of children were covered from Tertia, the interview questions were all relevant and their answers helped to deduce that they were more close to their biological parents, then, we could raise a question on the observation centered approach of the doctor and support the author's claim instead.
Hence, as the argument is based on several unwarranted assumptions , it fails to make a convincing case about which approach would be more accurate to study child-rearing traditions and other island cultures.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
flaws:
the arguments are not right on the point. Here goes a sample:
https://www.testbig.com/story/gre-argument-essay-topic-21-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: 11 15
No. of Words: 403 350
No. of Characters: 2046 1500
No. of Different Words: 163 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.48 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.077 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.835 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 143 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 119 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 98 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 53 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 36.636 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 13.033 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.727 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.454 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.654 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.271 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 4 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 199, Rule ID: ENGLISH_WORD_REPEAT_BEGINNING_RULE
Message: Three successive sentences begin with the same word. Reword the sentence or use a thesaurus to find a synonym.
...nstead of their own biological parents. The specific observations on which the conc...
^^^
Line 3, column 403, Rule ID: IF_WOULD_HAVE_VBN[1]
Message: Did you mean 'had made'?
Suggestion: had made
...n the argument accordingly. If Dr Field would have made a very extensive set of observations sp...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 34, Rule ID: ENGLISH_WORD_REPEAT_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a word
Suggestion: the
...ch. Another aspect is that according the the author, the interviews were conducted f...
^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 34, Rule ID: DT_DT[1]
Message: Maybe you need to remove one determiner so that only 'the' or 'the' is left.
Suggestion: the; the
...ch. Another aspect is that according the the author, the interviews were conducted f...
^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 613, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
... stand of child-rearing traditions, the authors argument about the interview centered a...
^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 67, Rule ID: COMMA_PARENTHESIS_WHITESPACE
Message: Put a space after the comma, but not before the comma
Suggestion: ,
...based on several unwarranted assumptions , it fails to make a convincing case abou...
^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
accordingly, but, hence, if, then, kind of, talking about
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 26.0 19.6327345309 132% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 9.0 12.9520958084 69% => OK
Conjunction : 15.0 11.1786427146 134% => OK
Relative clauses : 13.0 13.6137724551 95% => OK
Pronoun: 30.0 28.8173652695 104% => OK
Preposition: 50.0 55.5748502994 90% => OK
Nominalization: 11.0 16.3942115768 67% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2079.0 2260.96107784 92% => OK
No of words: 403.0 441.139720559 91% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.158808933 5.12650576532 101% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.48049772903 4.56307096286 98% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.86733574988 2.78398813304 103% => OK
Unique words: 176.0 204.123752495 86% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.436724565757 0.468620217663 93% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 634.5 705.55239521 90% => 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: 6.0 8.76447105788 68% => OK
Subordination: 7.0 2.70958083832 258% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 0.0 4.22255489022 0% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 11.0 19.7664670659 56% => 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: 36.0 22.8473053892 158% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively long.
Sentence length SD: 78.2446893083 57.8364921388 135% => OK
Chars per sentence: 189.0 119.503703932 158% => OK
Words per sentence: 36.6363636364 23.324526521 157% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.18181818182 5.70786347227 91% => OK
Paragraphs: 4.0 5.15768463074 78% => More paragraphs wanted.
Language errors: 6.0 5.25449101796 114% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 4.0 8.20758483034 49% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 5.0 6.88822355289 73% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 2.0 4.67664670659 43% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.27269081492 0.218282227539 125% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.125687443245 0.0743258471296 169% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0679336910336 0.0701772020484 97% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.153591256016 0.128457276422 120% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0882507992011 0.0628817314937 140% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 21.2 14.3799401198 147% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 34.94 48.3550499002 72% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 17.3 12.197005988 142% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.24 12.5979740519 105% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.4 8.32208582834 101% => OK
difficult_words: 76.0 98.500998004 77% => More difficult words wanted.
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 16.4 11.1389221557 147% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 50.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.0 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.