¶ … measuring someone physical reflexes by seeing how fast they can react to something being dropped.
We will use a broomstick and make measurements on the broomstick with a marker and ruler. The measurements will be in millimeters so that we can use the metric scale for calculations. There will be a starting point on the broom stick where the measurements start somewhere near the middle of the broomstick. Subjects will be selected randomly and some basic demographic information will be collected such as age, gender, weight, height, whether they wear glasses and any other relevant factors that we can come up with. The participants will all start with their hands and the beginning of the broomstick where the measurements are located. Their top finger will represent the beginning of the measuring scale as they prepare. The experimenters will then release the broom stick and see how long it takes the participant to catch it. We can measure the distance in which the broomstick traveled which will allow us to calculate the time it took for them to react and catch the falling broomstick. This experiment will be repeated five times and the average will be used as the data point for that individual.
Data Collection
Whatever demographic information we collect can then be used to determine if there is any correlation between any of the factors (such as age, gender, weight, etc.) that are associated with the reaction time. A sample data collection form may look like the following.
Participant
Age
Gender
Height (inches)
Weight
Glasses (y/n)
Reaction (mm)
1
19
M
70
N
10
2
18
F
65
N
11
3
21
M
72
Y
13
4
34
M
71
Y
12
5
19
F
68
N
11
6
42
F
64
Y
14
7
21
M
73
N
13
Conclusion
The number of participants was a severe limitation in the study. A much larger sample size would be needed to draw a stronger conclusion. However, it appears that wearing glasses and age might be correlated to reaction time in this experiment
