- Bag
- Two alphabets with Styrofoam letters
- Two stopwatches
Procedure:
Insert a Styrofoam alphabet into each box compartment.
Separate the students by gender and tell them that it is a game.
Pick a girl and a boy to do the experiment and set them side by side with their hands by their sides and facing the box.
Tell them they have to guess the letter they touch as fast as they can.
Count down from three and when you reach the end they can insert their hands and you start the stopwatch.
The students have to try to guess what letter they are touching but they are not allowed to look at it before they say the letter out loud.
When the student says the letter out loud (before pulling it out) stop the stopwatch and record the time.
Record if the student got the letter correct.
Repeat the procedure with the rest of the students.
Quantitative data
Time it took each student to say what letter they thought they were touching (seconds) +/- 1*
*Uncertainty calculated to +/-1 instead of +/-0.1 in regard of the possible human error.
*Uncertainty calculated to +/-1 instead of +/-0.1 in regard of the possible human error.
Sample Average Calculation:
5+4+2+5+4+8+7+12+15+4+10+5+10+12+26+5+15+6+9=185
163/19=8.6
Average=8.6 +/- 1 seconds
Number of guessed letters that were correct for both boys and girls**
**No Uncertainty because there was no possibility for error.
**No Uncertainty because there was no possibility for error.
Sample Total Calculation:
1+1+0+0+1+1+1+1+0+1+0+1+0+0+0+0+0+1+1=10
Total answers correct=10
Qualitative data
Conclusion and evaluation:
Based on the data acquired, the hypothesis was correct. When both genders were exposed to the same tactile object, in this case the Styrofoam letters, girls where more successful at analyzing the letters they were touching. Girls guessed a total of 13 letters while boys guessed a total of 10 letters. On the other hand, on average, the boys had a tendency to take less time to think about what they were touching as they took an average of 8.6 seconds compared to the girls in 9.1 seconds. This tendency could be due to the fact that the experiment was proposed as a game where the students had to guess as fast as they could. Moreover, this could have been the factor that determined the number of letters they got correct because they spent less time thinking about what they were touching and analyzing, trusting their first guess. Oppositely, the girls spent more time thinking about what they were touching and then did not pressure themselves to do them faster. Since one of the rules was that if the fastest team got it wrong the point could go to the other team if they guessed it right, the girls were supporting their teammates to guess it right. Furthermore, we can deduce from this experiment that the girls’ nerve endings were closer to the epidermis and therefore, they can better identify objects by touch.
During the investigation, the children were exposed to the experiment through a game. This was a possible weakness because they spent less time thinking about the letter they were touching and so it could be the reason why they guessed less letters correctly. If the time would have been controlled and both genders had the same time to guess the letters, it is possible that the boys would have guessed more letters than the girls. Another possible error was how the time was calculated with the stopwatches. There was only one person for two stopwatches, therefore the uncertainty was changed to +/- 1 because taking into consideration the time it takes the child to say the word, your brain to interpret that information and then stop the time a second could easily go by. If both children ended at similar times, it is possible that the stopwatch was stopped at a later time.
To improve the lab we should perform a parallel lab in which the only dependent variable is the number of letters correct. Through this we would be able to determine if the time of analysation affected the number of correct guesses and if under pressure, boys or girls were better at identifying the letter. Another change that could be preformed would be to increase the number of students that were experimented upon. This would increase the range of data and its accuracy. The final possible change that could be done would be to have more that one person calculating the time so that the possible human error would decrease from +/-1 to +/- 0.1.
by
dakota123 (student)
