Name: Period: Blue or Gold 1 2 3 4

The Caffeine Experiment

A. Define the following terms:
1. Independent variable (test variable)

2. Dependent variable (observed result)

3. Constant

4. Control Group

B. Read the description of The Caffeine Experiment:

An experiment was designed to study the effect of caffeine on the heartbeat of water fleas. Two
populations of water fleas were grown. Both Population 1 and Population 2 had water with the same
mineral content, were supplied with the same amounts of bacteria as food, received the same amount of
light, and had their temperature kept at 20 degrees Celsius. Every two hours the fleas from Population 1
had caffeine given to them; the fleas in Population 2 got nothing. Five minutes after administering
caffeine, fleas from each population were selected and their heartbeats were counted.
1. Items 1 – 4 list factors from the experiment. Match each factor with the correct term from the
list of words you defined above. The terms may be used more than once.
a. Food
b. Heartbeat
c. Water temperature
d. Population 2
e. Light
f. Mineral content
g. Caffeine
2. Write a hypothesis for this experiment.

3. Design a table to record the data from the experiment. (Please use the use the space below.)