Cause and Effect Experiments
experiments to detect cause-and-effect connections. If you are interested in
gardening, for example, you might try adding plant food to one bed of flowers
but not another and then ask the question: Does the use of plant food (the
independent variable) affect the size of the flowers (the dependent variable)?
By comparing unfed plants (the control group) to those receiving plant food
(the experimental group), you could then find out if plant food is worth using.
Think of at least two different informal experiments you’ve
conducted in the last few months, or consider a couple of experiments you would
like to conduct. Answer the following questions:
(1) What is the hypothesis?
(2) What were the independent and dependent variables?
(3) Were any important extraneous variables
controlledâ?”if so, how? If not, how would you control for the extraneous
variables?
(4) What was the outcome of the experiment?
(5) Are the conclusions warrantedâ?”why, or why not?
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