The following appeared in a health newsletter.
"Nosinia is an herb that many users report to be as effective as prescription medications at fighting allergy symptoms. Researchers recently compared Nosinia to a placebo in 95 men and women with seasonal allergies to ragweed pollen. Participants in the study reported that neither Nosinia nor the placebo offered significant relief. However, for the most severe allergy symptoms, the researchers reported that Nosinia was more effective than the placebo in providing relief. Furthermore, at the end of the study, participants given Nosinia were more likely than participants given a placebo to report feeling healthier. We therefore recommend using Nosinia to help with your severe allergy symptoms.
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be answered in order to decide whether the recommendation and the argument on which it is based are reasonable. Be sure to explain how the answers to these questions would help to evaluate the recommendation.
The author of the health newsletter recommends using Nosinia, a herb, to help patients with acute allergy symptoms. He provides support for his recommendation providing evidences of the researchers’ report on the better efficacy of Nosinia than Placebo in providing relief, showing participants given Nosinia felt healthier than the participants given placebo. However, this argument, as it stands on surface is seriously flawed and these following three questions must be answered before evaluating the conclusion.
First of all, is the number of men and women, with seasonal allergies to ragweed pollen, quite significant to consider it as a good sample point for conducting research? The author assumes that the number ‘95’ is quite high to represent a good sample for research. However, this may not be the case. This number can be quite low in comparison to be treated it as a good sample. If this is the case, then the research will not be reliable and result obtained by this will be faulty. The argument fails to consider this case and so it is seriously weakened.
Secondly, how the researchers reached such a conclusion that Nosinia is more effective than placebo in providing relief without providing necessary evidences of the specific severe allergy symptoms? The author prematurely assumes that Nosinia works for most of the severe allergy cases. In reality, this may not be true. It is quite likely that Nosinia only works for some severe allergy cases, the other cases are out of its bound. If this is the case, then the argument will not hold water.
Last, but not least, how the researchers reached to the conclusion that participants given Nosinia felt healthier than participants given placebo? The author assumes the absence of other factors that may be responsible for the well-being of the participants having Nosinia. However, this may not be the case in reality. Perhaps, some other factors and Nosinia jointly worked for betterment of the participants having this. The argument fails to provide evidence for this case and thus is severely flawed.
In conclusion, the argument, as it stands, is flawed due to its reliance on unwarranted assumptions. If the author is able to provide answers to the above stated three questions and additional evidences to support his answers, then the recommendation for using Nosinia to cope with severe allergy symptoms can be properly evaluated otherwise it will remain seriously flawed as it stands on the surface.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 21 15
No. of Words: 403 350
No. of Characters: 2024 1500
No. of Different Words: 161 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.48 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.022 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.709 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 159 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 122 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 76 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 49 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 19.19 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.495 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.667 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.321 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.522 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.06 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, first, however, if, may, second, secondly, so, then, thus, well, in conclusion, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 23.0 19.6327345309 117% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 11.0 12.9520958084 85% => OK
Conjunction : 8.0 11.1786427146 72% => OK
Relative clauses : 6.0 13.6137724551 44% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 31.0 28.8173652695 108% => OK
Preposition: 41.0 55.5748502994 74% => OK
Nominalization: 11.0 16.3942115768 67% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2094.0 2260.96107784 93% => OK
No of words: 403.0 441.139720559 91% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.19602977667 5.12650576532 101% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.48049772903 4.56307096286 98% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.79922301759 2.78398813304 101% => OK
Unique words: 180.0 204.123752495 88% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.446650124069 0.468620217663 95% => 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: 7.0 4.96107784431 141% => OK
Article: 9.0 8.76447105788 103% => OK
Subordination: 5.0 2.70958083832 185% => OK
Conjunction: 1.0 1.67365269461 60% => OK
Preposition: 4.0 4.22255489022 95% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 21.0 19.7664670659 106% => OK
Sentence length: 19.0 22.8473053892 83% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 65.9685900659 57.8364921388 114% => OK
Chars per sentence: 99.7142857143 119.503703932 83% => OK
Words per sentence: 19.1904761905 23.324526521 82% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.61904761905 5.70786347227 81% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 5.25449101796 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 8.0 8.20758483034 97% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 10.0 6.88822355289 145% => 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: 0.222964702834 0.218282227539 102% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0722335096373 0.0743258471296 97% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0549438631033 0.0701772020484 78% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.138223323453 0.128457276422 108% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0434221398598 0.0628817314937 69% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.7 14.3799401198 88% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 52.19 48.3550499002 108% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.7 12.197005988 88% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.88 12.5979740519 102% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.38 8.32208582834 101% => OK
difficult_words: 97.0 98.500998004 98% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.5 12.3882235529 117% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.6 11.1389221557 86% => 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.