The following appeared as part of a letter to the editor of a scientific journal.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 situa

In considering the article which is a part of the letter to the editor of a scientific journal, there can be seen various doubts on the validity of the explanations provided by the author, which can cast doubt on the validity of his/her explanations. The study concerns on two cases as prove about the effect of levels of stimulation on rhesus monkeys firstborn infants.

The first concern of the study has concentrated on the assumption that the Cortisol level as a hormone is related to the stimulation. The author has argued that firstborn rhesus monkeys will produce a twice degree of cortisol when they are under the effect of stimulation which is unreliable argument due to some reasons, firstly, what is the reason that Cortisol level in the rhesus monkeys is related to the stimulation? Maybe, their body can produce cortisol just as a sign of increased body activity or maybe cortisol is the by-product of other chemical reactions which aren’t related to the stimulation. Also, the author has argued that because cortisol level in human’s first born infants first born will rise when they are confronting with their family after a while so this can be a reason to believe that this assumption is viable in the research about monkeys which is invalid assumption due to the fact that author’s idea about monkeys is about their confrontation with unfamiliar situations, but his/her idea about humans is about when they encounter with their parents who aren’t unfamiliar to the firstborn infants.

Furthermore, the author of the letter hasn’t mentioned to the method that he/she has used to investigate and elicit information so it is the probability that his method of experimentation of human’s infants and monkey’s infants isn’t analogous which will lead to two different conclusions although first observations could be similar.

Other explanation of the author about the level of cortisol during pregnancy of the first-time mothers and several-time mothers is not valid because he/she hasn’t provided any detailed data about the difference in the level of Cortisol in these two kinds of mothers. There is possibility that the difference is negligible and it is not so high that we can assume it unnoticeable disparity, so maybe the author’s result is based on a wrong assumption that minute differences are considerable. Repeatability and reproductivity of the method of the author is also under doubt because there is no information about repeating the experiment on the rhesus monkeys. One can argue that one-time experiment is not valid because in different situations, data may lose their validity. At last, there is no information about same comparison between first-time mothers of human and monkeys provided by the author to strengthen his/her argument.