Self-study
Therapist: Support In a recent study, researchers measured how quickly 60 different psychological problems waned as a large, diverse sample of people underwent weekly behavioral therapy sessions. █████ ██ ███████ ██ ███ ██ ████████ ████████████ ███████ ██ ██████ ██ █████ ██ ████████ ████ █████ ████ ██ ██████ ██████████ ███████ ████████ ███ ███ ████ ████ ██████ █████
Summarize Argument
The author concludes that most people only need 50 weekly behavioral therapy session in order to clear up the psychological problems they have. This is based on a study in which researchers measured how quickly 60 different psych. problems cleared up among a sample of people who had weekly therapy sessions. 75% of the 60 problems cleared up within 50 weeks.
Identify and Describe Flaw
The author overlooks the possibility that most people have a psych problem that takes longer than 50 weeks to clear up. The fact 45 out of 60 types of psych. problems clear up in 50 weeks doesn’t tell us whether most people with a psych. problem have one of those 45 problems. Most might have one of the 15/60 that takes longer than 50 weeks.
25.
The therapist's argument is logically ████ ██████████ ██ █████████ ██ ███ ███████ ████ ██
a
takes for granted ████ █████ ███ ██ █████████████ ████████ ████ ███████ ████ █████████████ ██████ ██ █████ ██ ████ ███ ██ █████████████ ████████ ███████
The author doesn’t assume that there’s no problem that takes longer to clear up than the 60 studied. She only needs to assume that if those problems exist, most people do not have those longer-to-clear-up problems.
b
fails to address ███ ███████████ ████ ███ █████ ███ ██ ███ ██ █████████████ ████████ ███████ █████ ███████ ████ ██████
The author assumed that most people have one of the 45 problems that cleared up within 50 weeks. But this overlooks that most people might have one of the 15 problems that took longer to clear up.
c
takes for granted ████ ██ ███ ███████ ████ ████ ████ ███ ██ ███ ██ █████████████ ████████ ███████
Even if you think having multiple problems could require more than 50 weeks to clear up, the author doesn’t have to assume “no one” has more than one problem. She would only need to assume that most people don’t have more than one problem.
d
fails to address ███ ███████████ ████ ████ █████ ██ ███████ ████ █████ ████ ██████ ██ ██ █████████ ██ ██████████ ███ █████████████ ████████
We know that certain problems cleared up with weekly behavioral therapy sessions. So, there’s evidence that behavioral therapy works. Also, the author doesn’t conclude that any kind of therapy will be enough for most people; she specifies behavioral therapy.
e
takes for granted ████ ███ ██████ ██ ██████ ███████ ███ ███ ████ █████████████ ████ █████████████ █████████ ██ ████████ ████ ███ ██████████ ██ █ █████
The study concerns the time required for various psychological problems to clear up. Whether the sample had more problems than average is irrelevant, because we can still measure the clear-up rate of the problems present in the sample.