argument200 [OB小组] 第10次作业 牙医与男病人

xiao8686UID: 2266881

TOPIC: ARGUMENT200 - Statistics collected from dentists indicate that three times more men than women faint while visiting the dentist. This evidence suggests that men are more likely to be distressed about having dental work done than women are. Thus, dentists who advertise to attract patients should target the male consumer and emphasize both the effectiveness of their anesthetic techniques and the sensitivity of their staff to nervous or suffering patients.
WORDS: 593          TIME: 00:29:32+10          DATE: 2007-7-23 18:59:10

In this argument, the arguer recommends the dentists who advertise to attract more patients should target on male consumers and stress their anesthetic techniques as well as the sensitivity of their staff to nervous or suffering patients. And such suggestion is based on the statistics collected from dentists who report that three times more men than women fain while visiting the dentist, which in the arguer's opinion, indicates men are more inclined to be distressed of having dental work done. However, close scrutiny reveals such argument is groundless and suffers from several critical flaws.

First of all, the statistics collected from dentists lend little reliable supports that male patients are more likely to be distressed about having dental work done. For one thing, the arguer provides no information about the how the statistics are collected and backgrounds of the dentists who reported them. It is quite possible that those statistics are reported by the dentists of one or two local hospital while the majority of people visit their private dentists instead. Thus, the statistics can not be representative at all. For another, the seeming data can hardly suggest that man are more easily be distressed than woman about having dental work done. The arguer needs to offer information about the total numbers of male and female patients as well. Otherwise, it is highly possible that men, comparing to women are more willing to visit dentists when they have dental problems, which means the number of male patients may far overweigh that of female patients. In that case, the ratio of fainted men to the total male patients could probably much lower than that of women. In sum, the mere statistics can barely sustain the deduction that men are more inclined to be distressed about having their dental work done than women are.

Furthermore, the arguer is too hasty to conclude that dentists should target on male consumers. As a matter of fact, it is quite possible that the number of female patients is much smaller than male patients just as mentioned in the last paragraph. And one possibility is that women are more likely to suffer the pain the deal with the problem by themselves instead of visiting their dentists. Therefore, there is such a potential consumer-group that could be explored by the dentists.  If dentists only focus on their business on male consumers just as recommended by the arguer, they may lose a large amount of profits.

Finally, the arguer ignores other factors that need to be taken into account while advertising dentists' business. For example, the sanitary conditions, the attitude of the stuff, even the scale of clinics can be important factors in attracting consumers. Dentists ought to consider thoroughly finding out the facets that needs to be improved rather than indiscriminately emphasizing their anesthetic techniques and sensitivity of their stuff to nervous and suffering patients. If a dentist has been reputed for its anesthetic skills and his/her stuff sensitivity to patients already while the sanitary conditions are dissatisfactory, then what requires improvements and highlight in his/her advertisement will not be the issues recommended by the arguer .

In conclusion, the argument is not persuasive as it stands. To make it more convincing, the arguer needs to lend more evidence to support that men comparing to women are indeed more prone to be distressed about having their dental work done and they are the major consumers of their business. Nevertheless, the most effective way to advertising the businesses of different dentists is to emphasize on different aspects according to their situations.