--Original published at Site Title

I watched one of the Mythbusters videos for this blog.  It explored the topic of hands free driving devices and their ability to improve driving safety.  There were a lot of good things they did to test this idea, but also quite a few things that could have been done to improve their experiment and make it a little better.

The first mini test was a driving course set up the same for both the two drivers. I thought this was a strength having the same course design meant that the level of difficulty wouldn’t vary with the driver.  However, some people generally tend to just be better at driving than others as well as better at multitasking.  The questions that were asked of each driver either through the phone or Bluetooth triggered the same part of brain, the prefrontal cortex.  The asking of the same type of question to each driver was also a strength of this study.  The downfall this experiment had was that one individual only did hands free driving and the other only did hands full driving they didn’t switch roles. Who is to know if the two men in the test have the same skills in driving or if one is naturally a little more talented at driving than the other.  Adding more than just two people to this study would help to come to a better conclusion as well.

The second test involved 30 volunteer drivers in a driving simulator created at Stanford. They were then divided into two groups those using a phone and those using Bluetooth, both groups receiving GPS instructions.  The course was monitored on a computer screen so each individual ran the same one in a controlled environment and the same car, this was a major strength for the experiment.  I think another strength for this test was also the size. More people could help the experiment to receive better results.  However, the age of the participants wasn’t specified.  I think we can all agree a 17 year old driver would have quite a different driving experience than a 40 year old driver.  Gender also wasn’t taken into account which could be a whole other topic in itself, are men better drivers than women?  The participants did not switch roles either from hands full to hands free they just completed the course using one.  Having a separate group run the simulation with the use of no devices to test the difference in performance as a control, could have also heled to see clearer results. I believe running a controlled simulated course in the same car with lets say,  30 men ranging from 35-45 years old would be a better test.  Each of the men getting a chance to do the test with no devices, with Bluetooth devices, and lastly with their hands full.

--Original published at Site Title

The research question I would look into is if looking at a phone before attempting to sleep really interrupts the sleeping process as a whole. There is research done pertaining to how the blue light a tablet or phone gives off affects the quality of your sleep because it alters the levels of Melatonin controlling person’s sleep cycle. This research was done by Sleep.org which was very interesting to read on, as they go into how all electronics can make your sleep worsen over time. I paid close attention to cell phone use especially because it is more personal to me; I’m very attached to my phone! I believe that if more cell phone users put their phone down two hours before going to sleep each night, they would wake up less throughout the night, and feel more rested each morning. In order to test this hypothesis, I could take ten close friends, and ask them if they would be willing to put down their phones two hours early before going to bed, and then record how their sleep was every night. I would then take ten more teens and ask them to use their phones right before bed and record any symptoms they have waking up the next morning. I would then put both sets of recordings together and compare the results.

--Original published at Em

For this post I selected the make your own research project. As far as mental processes one topic that stood out in the syllabus was memory. Memory could be useful for studying for a test or just everyday. I really wonder the scientific reason why some random things we remember forever and other really important miscellaneous details slip my mind. How does something go from short term to long term memory? How long does it take to forget?

For this specific exercise  my research question is how long does it take for 15 words to be forgotten.  My hypothesis is the shorter amount of time the easier it will be for recall. I believe the participants will use the repetition technique to remember words. I predict that perhaps at the 30-45 second limit there may be some long term memory.

My procedure will be four groups. The setting will be a quiet classroom with only the the experimenter and the participant. First all participants will have given full consent to the experiment (18 or over).  There will be equal parts male and female ideally. They will be briefed the best possible explaining that they will be told 15 words. One group will be the control. This group will be asked to recall the words immediately after being told them, next 15, 30, 45. The other group will wait in another quiet classroom. There will be no interaction between the groups after they are tested as to not alert them to the words. The debrief will take place in the hallway.  They will be informed it was a test of memory and that they are free to access their results or withdraw them at any time. I would recruit them by volunteers. I would ask the first years as they need three hours of research time.