Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

Which type of data analysis should I use for my Science research proect?
I am testing the effect of soil temperature on the growth of bean plants.

Hi there,

How did you measure your plant growth? Height? Did you have multiple samples per group (more than one plant per temperature)?

Depending on what your measurement was, you could do statistical analysis and plot those results in a graph or table.

For example, if you measured height, you could calculate the mean and standard deviation of each temperature group at the end of the study and plot this in a bar graph (to see which temperature did the plant grow the best). You could also plot the mean of each temperature group at each time interval over time (to see how each group grew over time).

Here's a link to help with statistical analysis definitions and calculations:
http://www.cmh.edu/stats/definitions.asp

Here's a helpful link from the Science Buddies "How to do an experiment" toolkit for "Data Analysis and Graph":
https://www.sciencebuddies.org/mentorin ... ysis.shtml
Another great link:
http://www.mathleague.com/help/data/data.htm

Depending on what your hypothesis was, you would want to gear your analysis and how you show your data to demonstrate whether your experiment as proven or disproven your hypothesis.

Hope this helps and good luck!
-Bea