Onterra TutorWould a minimum age for social media protect young people?
TOEFL iBT writing question in the official format, with a full model answer and notes on why it scores. Write your own version below it and get an instant rater-style score.
The question
Your professor is teaching a class on developmental psychology. Write a post responding to the professor's question. In your response, express and support your opinion and add to the discussion in your own words. A strong response has at least 100 words.
Professor Adebayo: Several countries have debated setting a minimum age for social media accounts. Would such a law protect young people, or simply push them somewhere less visible?
Hannah: It would protect them. Thirteen-year-olds spend the day being measured against edited strangers, and no child chooses that. We already set ages for driving and for alcohol on exactly this reasoning.
Ivan: Age limits assume children cannot get past a box asking for a birth date. They can, and then they use these apps with nobody watching and nobody safe to ask for help.
Model answer
Ivan is right about the birth date box and still wrong about the conclusion. Rules that can be evaded are not useless: most teenagers do not buy alcohol, and not because the law is unbeatable, but because it removes the easy, frictionless route. An age limit would work the same way here, and it would move the burden from the child onto the platform, which is where Hannah's case is strongest. What neither of them mentions is enforcement design. A rule policed by asking users to state their age achieves nothing, while a rule that fines companies for accounts they can plainly see belong to children changes behaviour within a quarter. I would support the limit, with the penalty aimed at the platform rather than the family.
Why this answer scores
- Separates a valid observation from an invalid conclusion, which is exactly what 'add to the discussion' means.
- The alcohol comparison is an argument, not a decoration, and it does real work.
- Introduces enforcement, a dimension neither student raised, and finishes with a clear position.
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