Experiment question:
How do mealworms respond to light stimulus? (Do mealworms prefer light or dark environments?)
Hypothesis:
Mealworms prefer dark environments.
Independent variables:
- Light
Controlled variables:
- The number of mealworms
- The size of environment used
- Since only the mealworms were placed in the boxes, they would not respond to any other stimuli.
Dependent variables:
- How long it takes for the mealworm to move away from the light.
Assumption:
- Mealworm will move away from the light to a dark corner in a few seconds.
- edit: wrong. Mealworms are not injured is an assumption
Materials:
- 3 mealworms
- Black box with small opening
- Torchlight
- Timer
Procedure
- Put three mealworms into the black box with opening.
- Cover the small opening with finger.
- Look through the other opening.
- Slide the box such that the mealworms are in the dark corner.
- Remove finger and shine torchlight through the opening.
- Start stopwatch.
- Observe and record the amount of time it takes for the mealworm to move towards the light.
- Shine torchlight through the small opening.
- Ensure the mealworms are in the path of the light.
- Look through the other opening.
- Start stopwatch.
- Observe and record the amount of time it takes for the mealworm to move away from the light.
- Repeat step 2-11 for three times.
Data collected:
Time taken for mealworms to move in seconds |
|
From light to dark | From dark to light |
4.04 |
-nil- |
4.00 |
-nil- |
3.96 |
-nil- |
Data analysis:
- The mealworms moved away from the light source and into the dark corners in a few seconds.
- The mealworms do no move towards the light. Instead, the stay in the dark areas.
- Average amount of time for mealworms to move away from the light and into the dark is 3.00 seconds.
- From this, we could conclude that the mealworms will move away from light, so they prefer dark environments.
Conclusion:
- Mealworms respond to light stimuli by moving away from the light within a few seconds.
- Mealworms prefer dark environments.
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