The following appeared as part of an article in a business magazine.
"A recent study rating 300 male and female advertising executives according to the average number of hours they sleep per night showed an association between the amount of sleep the executives need and the success of their firms. Of the advertising firms studied, those whose executives reported needing no more than six hours of sleep per night had higher profit margins and faster growth. On the basis of this study, we recommend that businesses hire only people who need less than six hours of sleep per night."
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 argument stated above is faulty for numerous reasons. Essentially, the evidence offered to argue the main claims of the argument are not as cogent as they appear. Concluding businesses should only hire people who need less than six hours of sleep per night based on a superficially explained study and ignoring other aspects of the lifestyle of the executives is unreasonable.
Firstly, the author fails to provide the evidence to support the study referred to in the article. The author mentions 300 males and females were rated on the hours of sleep they obtained per night, but it is not mentioned how many individuals out of the sample size got no more than 6 hours of sleep every night. It may be that only 30 executives that were rated, sleep about 6 hours per night, this would mean 10% of the sample population sleeps 6 hours a night. If this were the case, then 10% is not a significant enough number to conclude there is an association between the average hours of sleep every night and the success of their firms, rendering the study unreliable. Moreover, the article does not discuss how this association was shown and how this data was computed. It could be that these executives were a part of a self-reporting survey. In self-reporting studies, individuals tend to be untruthful or not completely fixed on any answer. There is no method to measure the authenticity of the answers given. Using these kinds of surveys would weaken the argument even more. On the other hand, if the author presented statistics that showed 200 people out of 300 were only sleeping 6 hours per night, the argument would deem to be more plausible. In either case, the author still does not mention the methods taken to conduct the study.
Additionally, the argument neglects to address other issues presented. Imagine there is a credible method that illustrates that most successful executives were only sleeping for 6 hours, it is still baseless to conclude the fact that these people are sleeping 6 hours is the sole reason for their success. So, the author continues to speculate other factors are not playing a role in the succession of certain firms. For example, the leaders that slept 6 hours per night could also be spending 10-12 hours per day in the office with staff. Since they are devoting extra time to their work lives, they could also be accomplishing more in their long days. This distinction could be a reason that is demonstrating the perceived positive outcomes, which would further undermine the conclusion of the argument. However, if new information comes to light describing that all executives are working the same number of hours, the argument would hold more validity. But even so, it is difficult to account for all differing factors, so other aspects can be overlooked.
Lastly, the argument is built upon foundationless assumptions. For one, the author states out of those interviewed, successful executives reported on getting no more than 6 hours of sleep every night. But the author then continues to say that for firms to succeed, their leaders should get less than 6 hours. Stating the association of success of the firm with no more than 6 hours of sleep is not the same as getting less than 6 hours of sleep per night. The many undescriptive statements in the argument weaken it further.
As a result of the various unwarranted presumptions made by the argument, the author fails to compile a compelling case to prove the succession of certain firms is due to their executives getting less than 6 hours of sleep per night.
| Post date | Users | Rates | Link to Content |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2022-07-20 | karmakar_asmi@2309 | 73 | view |
| 2022-06-17 | Soumyadip Kar | 55 | view |
| 2021-09-05 | bislam | 58 | view |
| 2021-02-19 | Ashritha Gumudavally | 60 | view |
| 2020-11-24 | wenki31 | 58 | view |
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Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.0 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 28 15
No. of Words: 608 350
No. of Characters: 2887 1500
No. of Different Words: 256 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.966 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.748 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.653 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 178 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 139 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 94 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 61 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 21.714 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.946 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.571 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.302 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.409 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.073 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 4 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 2, column 1010, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[2]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'answers'' or 'answer's'?
Suggestion: answers'; answer's
...thod to measure the authenticity of the answers given. Using these kinds of surveys wou...
^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, firstly, however, if, lastly, look, may, moreover, so, still, then, even so, for example, as a result, on the other hand
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 35.0 19.6327345309 178% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 14.0 12.9520958084 108% => OK
Conjunction : 8.0 11.1786427146 72% => OK
Relative clauses : 13.0 13.6137724551 95% => OK
Pronoun: 36.0 28.8173652695 125% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 66.0 55.5748502994 119% => OK
Nominalization: 19.0 16.3942115768 116% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2958.0 2260.96107784 131% => OK
No of words: 608.0 441.139720559 138% => Less content wanted.
Chars per words: 4.86513157895 5.12650576532 95% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.9656475924 4.56307096286 109% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.72260339603 2.78398813304 98% => OK
Unique words: 263.0 204.123752495 129% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.432565789474 0.468620217663 92% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 898.2 705.55239521 127% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 8.0 4.96107784431 161% => OK
Article: 15.0 8.76447105788 171% => OK
Subordination: 5.0 2.70958083832 185% => OK
Conjunction: 3.0 1.67365269461 179% => OK
Preposition: 4.0 4.22255489022 95% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 28.0 19.7664670659 142% => OK
Sentence length: 21.0 22.8473053892 92% => OK
Sentence length SD: 53.7113411047 57.8364921388 93% => OK
Chars per sentence: 105.642857143 119.503703932 88% => OK
Words per sentence: 21.7142857143 23.324526521 93% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.92857142857 5.70786347227 86% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 8.0 8.20758483034 97% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 14.0 6.88822355289 203% => Less negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 6.0 4.67664670659 128% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.295023879791 0.218282227539 135% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0728341280406 0.0743258471296 98% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0826727152326 0.0701772020484 118% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.170203840318 0.128457276422 132% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.066955661716 0.0628817314937 106% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.4 14.3799401198 86% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 58.62 48.3550499002 121% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.3 12.197005988 84% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 10.97 12.5979740519 87% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.95 8.32208582834 96% => OK
difficult_words: 126.0 98.500998004 128% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.4 11.1389221557 93% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Write the essay in 30 minutes.
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.