RA Analysis- Paper B Source

Living: Is Day Care Bad for Babies by Claudia Wallis

Time Magazine

R.A. Analysis (word count: 374)

1. The argument of this article is that there are changing views on whether or not daycare affects children. As time progresses more research is done that seems to lead to daycare having a negative affect.
2. Audience- parents who have children in daycare or are thinking about putting their children in daycare.
3. Goal- to get parents to look more into their daycare centers and if they really need to use daycare
4. How? The author uses logos most in this article. She gives statistics and research results from several decades about the affect of daycare. She shows how with each decade there seems to be more evidence leading to the fact that the mother is the most important caregiver. The author establishes ethos by quoting several psychologists, college professors and hospitals. She has gathered her information well. Pathos is used in some of the data given to appeal to parents concern for their child. An example is given that orphans babies who were given little attention or love from even their nurses, gave up on life essentially and stopped playing and eating. A parent would be quite disturbed by this finding.
5. Effective?- I think that this article is effective in informing parents of the many opinions on the matter and using reliable sources, but she does not have a clear stance on the matter. She ends the article as though she agrees with whatever the up to date research is. Each new generation different variables are added which vary the results. I think that this article could both inform and confuse parents. Although, I think this may be the objective of the article; so that parents will research and find out for themselves if daycare should be used rather than just trust one statistic.

STAR

1. Relevant- The author connects greatly to the audience, being parents, in that it gives many statistics of the affect daycare has on children. It gives a variety of statistics which parents like, because they always like to be thorough and have lots of opinions and resources when it comes to their children.
2. Accurate- The article is definitely fair in that it gives both sides of the argument and presents strong evidence on both sides.