Criteria B and C: Investigate reaction time

How does age affect our reaction time?

Andrej Ivanic 2b

Introduction

Reaction time calculates how quick an organism reacts to some type of stimulus. It is very important and
something that we use, mostly unconsciously, many times every day. It can be something as simple as
catching a basketball, or something much more serious which can help us survive in life threatening
situations. Even though my experiment is testing only age, there are many other factors that influence
reaction time, such as gender, fitness, health, fatigue, distractions, substances like drugs and alcohol,
and more.

Justification

SOI: Organisms are more likely to survive when they are adapted to interact with their surroundings and
respond to changes in their environment which make them more oriented in space and time.

The aim of my experiment is to show how reaction times from people of different age groups differ, or
does, and in what way aging influence our reactions. This can show around what age on average are we
strongest in this sense.

Hypothesis

As my RQ states, my experiment will be about how age affects our reaction time. I will take five different
people, all different age groups, and calculate their reaction time with help of the ruler drop test.

My hypothesis is: If I drop the ruler for people of different age groups to catch, then the younger they
are, the better reaction time they will have because reflexes slow with age. This is because reflexes are
one of the many age-related changes that happen in a human body. The signals start travelling slower to
the nerves and weakened muscles, as well as worsened flexibility of joints and tendons.

Variables

- The independent variable in this experiment is the ages of the participants, the age will be of
course measured in years (yo). There will be five participants, ages: 15, 21, 45, 50, 70. They are
all my family members.
- The dependent variable which will be measured is the reaction time of the participants, and it
will be measured in (cm), as I will calculate how much in distance does the ruler drop before
they catch it. The more centimeters I count will result in a slower reaction time, as the more the
ruler drops means it took more time for them to catch it, also vice versa.
- The controlled variables are a little tricky, as there are many factors that contribute to reaction
time. Still, we can try to make it the fairest by doing it at the same time of day, in the same
place, making sure they are equally rested, not under any substances such as alcohol, they are
all healthy, equally ready, and such. Some things I can’t control, for example how they feel, if
they are mentally distracted, or something similar. Still, I will try to keep everything I can the
same to get the best and most accurate results.
Method

Step Description
1. Gather everything you need
2. Gather all 5 participants
3. Hold the ruler with your hand at the top
4. Place the participants fingers at the bottom of the ruler. (0cm)
5. When you drop the ruler, they have to catch it as fast as possible
6. See at how many cm they caught it, repeat 3 times for each candidate
7. Insert the data in the lab report

Experimental set up

Materials

All you need is a 30cm ruler.

Safety concerns

There aren’t any major concerns, as it is a very simple experiment, however you can be careful to
not knock over or break something when dropping the ruler.

Raw data

Participant (age) Trial 1 (cm) Trial 2 (cm) Trial 3 (cm)

15 7.92 10.24 2.31
21 8.37 5.43 7.53
45 16.41 9.23 10.95
50 8.27 6.67 13.74
70 Missed (30) 22.32 24.79

Above is presented the table of the results I got from this experiment done with my family
members.
 Visual data

For the visual data, I took the average of each participant’s three trials.

Data Analyzing

After doing the experiment and analyzing the results, we can see that my hypothesis was mostly true.
The older we went, the slower the reflexes got, as well as the oldest even missing the whole ruler once.
But something that we also concluded from our experiment, is that the males who did it (15, 21, 50), all
did better than the females (45,70). Even though one male (50) was older than the female (40), he still
had better reflexes. Now we could say this was because of gender, but it could also be because of some
other factor, the only way to check this is to do a separate gender experiment with many more
participants, and then evaluate the results as a whole. Other than those 2, reaction time from all got
slightly worse by age.

Conclusion

This is a very simple experiment, therefore there weren’t any problems while doing the experiment.
Although, because of the simplicity of the experiment we can never know if it the results were 100%
based on only age. Generally, the results make sense and match up with the scientific evidence and facts
that are found on the internet. So, I would conclude this as a very fun and simple experiment which can
be labeled as a success. The only thing that could improve it is to bring more participant’s next time.
 REFERENCES

1. Jain, A., Bansal, R., Kumar, A., & Singh, K. D. (2015). A comparative study of visual and auditory
reaction times on the basis of gender and physical activity levels of medical first year students.
International journal of applied & basic medical research. Retrieved October 15, 2022, from
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4456887/
2. Reaction time. Reaction Time - an overview | ScienceDirect Topics. (n.d.). Retrieved October 15,
2022, from https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/biochemistry-genetics-and-molecular-
biology/reaction-time
3. Robert H. Shmerling, M. D. (2016, March 14). My fall last fall: Reaction time and getting older.
Harvard Health. Retrieved October 15, 2022, from https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/my-
fall-last-fall-201603149311