ARGUMENT53【0906G 文以载道三月四月作文小组】第2周第1次作业 by 昭阳V32

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题目：ARGUMENT53 - Thirteen years ago, researchers studied a group of 25 infants who showed signs of mild distress when exposed to unfamiliar stimuli such as an unusual odor or a tape recording of an unknown voice. They discovered that these infants were more likely than other infants to have been conceived in early autumn, a time when their mothers' production of melatonin-a hormone known to affect some brain functions-would naturally increase in response to decreased daylight. In a follow-up study conducted earlier this year, more than half of these children-now teenagers-who had shown signs of distress identified themselves as shy. Clearly, increased levels of melatonin before birth cause shyness during infancy and this shyness continues into later life.
字数：598          用时：00:54:00          日期：2009-1-17 22:29:54
提纲：
1，        复述作者主要观点，支出其结论是错误的；
2，        调查样本数量太少，可能有随机误差；
3，        调查的科学性值得怀疑（未考虑时间、地点等因素的影响）；
4，        即使调查是真实反映事实的，作者不应忽略幼儿成长中的其他外部因素，而这些因素恰恰是公认最为重要的。
5，        总结错误，作者应提供详细的信息和科学的调查方法并全面考虑才可得出结论。
In this argument, the arguer conclude that increased levels of melatonin before birth cause shyness during infancy and this shyness continues into later life. To support the conclusion, the arguer cited a research study that a group of infants who showed signs of mild distress when exposed to unfamiliar stimuli were more likely than other infants to have been conceived in early autumn, a time when their mother's production of melatonin known to affect some brain functions-would naturally increase in response to decreased daylight. In addition, the arguer reasons that since a follow-up study consequence that more than half of these children- now teenagers- who have shown signs of distress identified themselves as shy, it is increased levels of melatonin before birth cause shyness during infancy and this shyness continues into later life. This seemingly reasonable assertion suffers from several critical fallacies.

First, the argument is based on a research which need further discuss since its sample studied is only a group of 25. As common sense, to be accurate enough, the number of the sample in a statistical pool should be large enough to ignore the random error. Since thousands of infants are born every hour, it is dubious that whether these infants in the research are proper to represent the whole. Therefore, even though those infants showed signs of mild distress when exposed to unfamiliar stimuli were conceived in early autumn, there is no guarantee to the argument unless the arguer can prove that the research is scientific enough regardless of the small sample.

Second, how the research is conducted is also unknown which may give rise to great difference in different time and places. Even 25 infants are enough to do the research, the arguer ignores that a 13-year-ago research may not  fit the contemporary condition since our atmosphere are totally different, thus we can't reason from the research that the arguer is right. On the other hand, the arguer never mentions whether the research used scientific method considering the distribution of the infants' born place and their geometrical character.

Third, the arguer commits a fallacy of hasty generalization. The infants who showed signs of mild distress may be affected by other factors, such as their surrounding objects and people's actions. Though it is known that autumn is a season when mothers' production of melatonin would naturally increase in response to decreased daylight and melatonin's affection to the infants' brain function is demonstrated to be true, still without exclude other physical and chemical changes in the mothers' body we can't believe that the arguer's inference is exactly the fact.

Forth, the arguer also ignores some important point that determines a child's emotion which is widely admitted. Cultivating children is somewhat like cultivating a plant, the sunshine, the temperature, and the rain are demonstrated to be domain factors that formed the plant, that's why we can see the sunflowers born at the same time differ greatly. As the same, children's growth is  largely determined by his or her surroundings and teenagers' emotion is more complicated. In this view, the arguer maintain that increased levels of melatonin before birth cause shyness during infancy and this shyness continues into later life is unreasonable.

In conclusion, the arguer fails to establish a causal relationship between the increased levels of melatonin before birth and the shyness during the infants' teenager. To strengthen the argument, the arguer would have to provide more scientific research and details to provide the direct evidence which can successfully  exclude various accident errors and consider the important factors that cannot be ignored  to prove the assertion.

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