Mexican Jumping Bean Lab Report

Introduction
Mexican jumping beans are basically seeds that a larva of a small moth has occupied.
The larva will then proceed to eat the inside of the seed, making it hollow so when the
larva moves, it causes it to jump. Mexican jumping beans jump alot when exposed to
heat, because they are trying to maintain homeostasis.

Claim- We believe that the mystery creature is living, resulting it responding to the
stimulus of heat by jumping.
Materials
● Incandescent Lamps
● Led Lamps
● Petri dishes
● Beans
● Ruler
● Magnifying Glass
Method
● Separate the bean into two different pertri dishes
● Plug in Led lamp and Incandescent lamp
● Set a timer for 2 Minutes per trial
● Face the lamps directly on the beans
● Turn them on for two minutes and count the number of times it moved
● After two minutes timer rest the beans by taking them away from the lamp and
turning the lamp off
● Repeat until trial 6

Controlled Variables- Bean below lamp emitting just light.

Independent Variable- Bean below lamp emitting Heat and Light
Dependent Variable- Amount of times it jumped

Results
Intial Observations- Soft on one side and rough on the other(Qualitative), Not very
bouncy (Qualitative), Brown(Qualitative), It had something that looked like a
root(Qualitative), Jumps on its own(Qaulitative), 0.30 cm long (Quantitative) 0.10 cm
wide (Quantitative).
Table
1 50 25
2 48 22
3 60 16
4 42 52
5 52 0
6 30 15

Graph

Conclusion
Yes my results did support my hypothesis because I hypothesised that heat was the
stimulus that caused the bean to jump around, and after testing heat as the stimulus the
bean jumped a significant amount of times.
I learned that the scientific method is a very good way to approach a problem.
In other experiments in the future I should make sure that all other variables except the
independent variable should remain controlled

References
Armstrong W.P. Mexican Jumping Beans. 1992.
https://www2.palomar.edu/users/warmstrong/plaug97.htm