The following appeared in an article written by Dr. Karp, an anthropologist.
"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.
In this argument, the author concludes that the children in Tertia are raised by parents rather than villagers. He/She also points out that observation is not a valid method to study cultures. However, due to some logical flaws, these do not constitute a persuasive argument in favor of its conclusion and fail to provide convincing supports making the argument sound an invulnerable.
Citing survey of island children, the author reports that in Tertia, it is children’s parents who bring them up rather than entire village. It is not clear, however, the scope and validity of that survey. The author interviewed with children living in islands which includes Tertia. But it is not clear how many children were interviewed. Maybe only two kids were involved in the interview and then the survey is invalid. Even if the sample is large enough, maybe children who spend more time talking about their parents are not come from Tertia. Unless the survey is fully representative, valid and reliable, it can not be used to effectively back to the author’s argument.
Additionally, the author implies that spending more time talking about parents means that these children are reared by parents. However, the argument fails to provide any evidence to support this assumption. For example, maybe these children are in adolescence and they used to antagonizing their parents. Possibly they may run away from home, living in their classmates’ home. Then they would spend time complaining their parents during the interview. More evidence needs to be provided to convince the reader that these children are reared by their parents.
The author assumes too hastily that the observation approach is invalid because of the opposite conclusion. However, this divergence can be reasonable because Dr. Field did this survey twenty years ago. Perhaps 20 years ago the village was poor and parents had to work hard all day, and they take turns taking care of children. With the development of economy and technology, these parents have more time rearing their own children. To strengthen his/her argument, the author should provide evidence to show that children used to be reared by village to invalidate Dr. Field’s investigation.
To summarize, the arguer fails to substantiate his/her claim that Dr. Field’s conclusion and observation method are wrong because the evidence cited in the analysis does not and strongly support to what the arguer maintains. To make the argument more convincing, the author would have to provide more information with regard to the scope and constitution of his/her survey and more evidence to it is now parents who rears the children. Additionally, he would have to demonstrate that it is not the whole village that raised children 20 years ago.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 13 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 2 2
No. of Sentences: 24 15
No. of Words: 452 350
No. of Characters: 2261 1500
No. of Different Words: 206 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.611 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.002 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.574 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 168 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 124 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 80 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 40 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 18.833 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.255 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.542 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.317 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.506 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.103 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 369, Rule ID: DT_JJ_NO_NOUN[1]
Message: Probably a noun is missing in this part of the sentence.
...cing supports making the argument sound an invulnerable. Citing survey of island children, t...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 226, 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.
...y support to what the arguer maintains. To make the argument more convincing, the ...
^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, however, if, may, so, then, for example, talking about, with regard to
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 23.0 19.6327345309 117% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 7.0 12.9520958084 54% => OK
Conjunction : 13.0 11.1786427146 116% => OK
Relative clauses : 16.0 13.6137724551 118% => OK
Pronoun: 48.0 28.8173652695 167% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 54.0 55.5748502994 97% => OK
Nominalization: 22.0 16.3942115768 134% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2339.0 2260.96107784 103% => OK
No of words: 448.0 441.139720559 102% => OK
Chars per words: 5.22098214286 5.12650576532 102% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.60065326758 4.56307096286 101% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.73549539728 2.78398813304 98% => OK
Unique words: 212.0 204.123752495 104% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.473214285714 0.468620217663 101% => OK
syllable_count: 718.2 705.55239521 102% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 8.0 4.96107784431 161% => OK
Article: 10.0 8.76447105788 114% => OK
Subordination: 2.0 2.70958083832 74% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 24.0 19.7664670659 121% => OK
Sentence length: 18.0 22.8473053892 79% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 43.8214297842 57.8364921388 76% => OK
Chars per sentence: 97.4583333333 119.503703932 82% => OK
Words per sentence: 18.6666666667 23.324526521 80% => OK
Discourse Markers: 3.375 5.70786347227 59% => More transition words/phrases wanted.
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 2.0 5.25449101796 38% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 4.0 8.20758483034 49% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 9.0 6.88822355289 131% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 11.0 4.67664670659 235% => Less facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.202649153672 0.218282227539 93% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0588671779985 0.0743258471296 79% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.046369459158 0.0701772020484 66% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.116764746867 0.128457276422 91% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0425676194593 0.0628817314937 68% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.5 14.3799401198 87% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 53.21 48.3550499002 110% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.3 12.197005988 84% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.0 12.5979740519 103% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.95 8.32208582834 96% => OK
difficult_words: 97.0 98.500998004 98% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 8.0 12.3882235529 65% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.2 11.1389221557 83% => OK
text_standard: 13.0 11.9071856287 109% => 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.