Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

would it be possible to do the project of how do cats respond to bird sounds by observing only one cat because the project requires 10-15 cats to observe. and if yes pleas suggest some ideas ...

Hi,

I think you are doing this very interesting project from the Science Buddies website:


https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... p017.shtml

Yes, it would be possible to do this experiment with just one cat, but cats are individuals, so the results would not be as meaningful compared to including multiple animals. If your cat is one that sleeps through everything and does not respond to bird sounds, then your data would be very limited. I do recommend trying to locate more cats to include in your study. At the science fair, your project is going to be compared with other projects that will have a lot more data.

However, if you do the project with just one cat, you should collect as much data as possible. Teachers and science fair judges like lots of data. Test the cat at several times during the day and night and do multiple tests. Vary the volume of the bird calls, and perhaps try different varieties of bird calls. Does adding a model of a bird make any difference? How about using the bird sound with a moving cat toy? Do 3-5 replicates of each test so you can do statistical analysis of your results. Take lots of pictures.

I hope this helps. Please post again in this topic if you have more questions.

Donna Hardy

thank you very much now i'll be able to do this project successfully because of you but i have some doubts. as you said that: how about using the bird sound with a moving cat toy i didn't understand what you meant?

Hi,

Good question. Adding an artificial bird to the scenery would actually be adding a second independent variable to your experiment,. If you had several cats available, I would definitely not recommend this. However, with just one cat, you need to do something else. Once you have thoroughly tested your cat with the bird call app, try adding a small cat toy to the scenery that looks like a bird or other prey, and play the bird sounds with the bird to see if it makes any difference in the cat's response. You could also try this with a moving cat toy, perhaps a small electronic furby, or something similar that moves. You could determine if sound plus movement elicits significantly different results compared to sound alone.

How are you going to measure the cat's response? You might want to establish a number scale from 0 to 5 to rate the response, e.g. 0=kept sleeping, 1=opened eyes, etc. If you do this and carefully define the numbers, your results will be easier to graph.

One more suggestion that will help distinguish your project. All other conditions except the bird call should be controlled as much as possible, and you should explain what you will do to control allother parameters. This will be challenging because since cats don't come, you will have to find your pet, and conduct the trial wherever he is. However, you can make sure that there are no other distractions in the room such as movement and noise and don't start testing if the cat is upset at all (swishing tail); you should present the bird call using identical conditions every time (same distance and direction, temperature and light, etc.) and it might be helpful to have the noise come from behind the cat so you can observe if he turns to look for the source of the bird call.

What are you going to use for your independent variable? Time of day, volume of bird call, or species of bird? How many trials will you do for each test? Try for about 5 data points.

Donna Hardy

Hello!
thank you so much you have helped me a lot and the answer for your question (what to keep as independent variable) is that i'll keep time of day as the independent variable because whenever we draw a graph its convenient to take a variable of time the graph will be more accurate and beautiful in my opinion.thank you once again!

Hi,

That sounds perfect! If you plot time on the x-axis and the cat activity index on the y-axis, you should have a daily profile of activity and a nice graph. You can consider adding photographs of the cat exhibiting various activity indexes.

Good luck!

Donna Hardy

Hi
Thank you, soo much once again you have guided me in the correct way and thank you for wishing me(good luck) ok then i hope we'll meet soon in for my next year's project till then bye bye..

Poornima