Practicing the Genre: Arguing That a Cause Is Plausible

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PRACTICING THE GENRE

Arguing That a Cause Is Plausible

Making a cause-effect argument can be quite challenging and usually requires evidence. To think about how you could make a convincing argument, get together with two or three other students and follow these guidelines:

Part 1. The health effects of smoking are well known—particularly the increased risks of lung cancer and heart disease. Smoking by teenagers has been declining for at least a decade. Using the statistics in the following table, from the annual Monitoring the Future study conducted by University of Michigan researchers, discuss a few possible causes that would help explain why some high school students today choose to smoke cigarettes. (If you have some ideas about why there has been a decline in smoking over the last decade, you could explore causes of that trend instead.)

Percentage of 12th graders reporting that they 2011 1996
are daily smokers 10% 22%
have smoked in the last 30 days 19 34
have ever tried smoking 40 64

Then, pick one of those causes and discuss these questions:

  • Who might be interested in knowing about this cause?
  • What kinds of supporting evidence would you need to convince this audience that the cause you have identified is plausible?

Part 2. As a group, discuss what you learned from this activity:

  • Think about how your group initially came up with possible causes. For example, did you recall your own experience and observation? Did you consider different categories of causes, such as cultural, biological, psychological, or social?
  • When your group was discussing the kinds of supporting evidence needed to make a convincing argument about the cause’s plausibility, what did you assume about your audience?