Week 2 (2014) Comprehension and Interpretation Timm S Science

Week 2 (2014) Comprehension and Interpretation Timm’s Science

Directions: Answer all questions on a clean sheet of your own paper. Have fun with numbers 5 and 6 . . . Don’t stress out!

1) Name two abilities that you possess that will make you a better scientist.

2) Being organized is a good scientific quality. How could being organized make your daily life better or easier?

3) In your opinion, what are the three most important qualities or abilities of the world’s best scientists?

4) Professor Pete was conducting experiments to find out which brands of plant food would be better for ivy plants. He took nine plants and divided them into three groups. He gave water and plant food “X” to the first group, water and plant food “Y” to the second group, and only water to the third group. He placed all the plants into identical environments. The plants in groups “X” and “Y” were fed the same amounts of food at the same time and were watered identically. Plants in the first group grew 10 cm, the plants in the second group grew 13 cm and plants in the third group grew 9 cm.

Analyze the above experiment. Label a-d as either true or false.

a) The experiment is faulty because plants were not fed the same amount.

b) The investigation is faulty because the plants received too much light.

c) The experiment is not faulty; plants given only water grew taller

d) The experiment is not faulty; plants given food Y did the best. Week 2 (2014) Comprehension and Interpretation Timm’s Science

5) Read the following real, scientific inquiries. What do you think about them? Sometimes life is stranger than fiction – just like Calvin’s dad told us.

a) Psychologists at the University of Texas conducted a study in 1996 to determine if calling children “boys” or “girls” is harmful.

b) In 2001 scientists at Cambridge University studied kinetic energy, centrifugal force, and the coefficient of friction . . . to determine the least messy way to eat spaghetti.

6) Read the following scientific conclusions (a-h). Identify the ones that you think are true or false. Give your reasoning for doubting or believing the evidence.

a) Researchers at Georgetown University found that caterpillars can shoot their feces a distance of 40 times their body length.

b) According to a British Medical Journal report in 2003, Korean researchers have proven that karaoke is bad for your health.

c) In 2002 food industry researchers reported that when children were told they couldn’t have junk food, they wanted it even more. Industry spokespeople said that the study showed that children should decide for themselves how much junk food they should eat.

d) A 2002 study by the Department of Veterans Affairs Medical center in Vermont found that studies are often misleading.

e) Rhinotillexomania was outlined in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, June 2001. Nose- picking behavior was studied from a sample of 200 adolescents from four urban schools. It turns out to be a common activity. Almost the entire sample admitted to nose picking with a median frequency of four times a day.

f) Dr. Edwin Liem of the University of Louisville studied redheads and brunettes. He concluded that redheaded women are more sensitive. Using anesthetics, he found that they needed 20% more of the drug to numb their pain reflexes completely.

g) Australian researcher, Karl Kruselnicki discovered men get more belly button lint than women do. Blue is the dominant color. It is caused by friction between clothing and hair on the abdomen.

h) In October 2005, John Mainstone and the late Thomas Parnell were awarded the Ig Nobel Prize in Physics, for a pitch drop experiment, in which they’ve spent years waiting for Tar to be drip from a funnel. They’ve never actually seen it drip!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ig_Nobel