Body Temp and Reaction Time Essay

Words: 1844
Pages: 8

Can Your Body Tell the Time of Day? (NOTE: If you have thought of a statistics project that you would prefer to tackle instead of the one described below, contact me. I’ll try to make an equivalent project using your particular topic of interest.) Objective: You will measure how body temperature and reaction time vary throughout the course of a day, as well as related questions. In particular, you must address each of the questions below.  Question 1: At what time of the day is the body temperature highest? When is it lowest? How much difference is there? Are body temperatures between midnight and noon significantly different than body temperatures between noon and midnight? Question 2: At what time of the day does reaction time peak?
It is vital that you take your temperature accurately to be able to document the daily variation. Each time you want a temperature measurement, take the

temperature three times and use the average of these three readings as your measurement.
 To measure reaction time, you will use two online tests. Make sure that the participants practice using each test before data collection begins. Each

time you want a reaction time measurement, complete the test three times and use the average of these three readings as your measurement.

o The “Sheep Tranquilizer Game” is found at the Web Site http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/sleep/sheep/. This test from the British Broadcasting Corporation (the BBC) tests your reaction time by measuring how fast you are able to shoot escaping sheep with a tranquilizer. o The “Hit the Baseball Test” is found at the Web Site http://www.exploratorium.edu/baseball/reactiontime.html. This website from the Exploratorium Museum, in San Francisco, California, tests your ability to react to a 90-mile-per-hour fastball.  You must collect data from at least 4 participants.  Each participant must provide data on at least 3 different days.  Each day, data must be collected at least five times, including at least one measurement before 5:30 a.m. and one measurement after 8:00 pm.  You must have at least 100 rows of data.