Interview Transcripts

Interview One

0:00 | Alright, so, tell me about your model.

0:05 | Um, so there is a dehydrated or very thirst sailor and he’s so thirsty he decided to drink a
glass of saltwater, cause he has one of those lying around, and then he becomes even thirstier,
and then eventually dies.

0:22 | Okay, my question for you. Why is it that he is becoming thirstier?

0:28 | um, cause of the salt in the water.

0:31 | Okay, because of the salt in the water. And, what does the salt in the water do that makes
them thirsty

0:40 | I don’t know exactly, but I think it might be something where it like absorbs some of the
water, er, I don’t know, just makes it less effective. I don’t know, I don’t know how to put it.

0:51 | Okay so, it might make water absorption less affective in the body?

0:54 | Yeah, just cause, I mean, it’s got to do something bad, cause drinking saltwater, I know it
makes you thirsty because it’s happened to me every time I get sick. But um, I don’t know exactly
why.

1:14 | Okay, does the same thing happen if you drink freshwater?

1:18 | No.

1:19 | You don’t think so (No). Why?

1:21 | Um, I don’t know. But the only thing that’s missing in regular water, in fresh water, is all
the salt in it. I know there is salt in the freshwater, but the amount is like no where near the
amount that’s in salt water.

1:54 | So, the only difference is the content of the salt. Alright I want you to try and elaborate on
what you think our body can do with salt to try and maybe mitigate it…. So, if we drink saltwater,
its messing up our absorption, would everyone who drinks saltwater die like our sailor did in the
shipwrecked sailor scenario?

2:23 | No, he was already super dehydrated so that happened to just finish it off, type of thing.

2:30 | Okay, so something might have already been happening.

 2:35 | Right, I mean he already had, I don’t know, he was already dehydrated so I mean, I could
drink saltwater and it just tastes bad, but I won’t die.

2:45 | Okay, and if you could drink saltwater and it would make you thirsty but it wouldn’t
necessarily kill you, okay, where in your body do you think all of that is happening? That you’re
going to be affected that it might absorb water?

3:01 | um, not the stomach, maybe in the, maybe the stomach, in the stomach…. In the stomach
or maybe in the small intestines. (small intestines?) I think, wait, I can’t remember which absorbs
nutrients, whichever one absorbs the nutrients.

3:27| Okay, after, so we know, so you remember the digestive system, that’s awesome. So it’s
going to go in, water is going to be absorbed, you’re right it’s the small intestine that it’s going to
be absorbed in. What happens after its absorbed.

3:40 | Um, there’s no water, wait, what do you mean what happens?

3:48 | so, would it even be absorbed if it’s saltwater or would it not?

3:52 | well, it would be absorbed, it’s just the salt wouldn’t be.

3:57 | Okay, so the salt would stay in your body, but the water would be absorbed?

4:01 | Well that doesn’t sound right. Um, some of the salt would, I don’t know about all of it.
Probably all of it, probably all the salt and that’s what makes you thirsty.

4:10 | Okay, so it would get absorbed and that absorption is what is making you thirsty by
default.

4:18 | Alright, thank you for sharing.

Interview Two

0:00 | Alright, tell me about your model.

0:02 | Okay, so this is it. I decided to make it like a comic. (I love it) so basically, that’s the one
who like gets to have the salt, and then it’s showing the salt is beginning to like kill the h2o
because it’s taking the h2o away. And so H2O dies and she keeps on like taking it in again and
again as you can see and then she dies.

0:38 | It is a really cool drawing, let me just start with that. That’s really cool. So, let me ask you.
So we are talking about a unique situation in which a sailor has drunken it and then died. Would
everyone who drinks saltwater die?

0:53 | um, well it depends on how much you have.

0:58 | Okay, so quantity matters (yes). Okay. How is drinking saltwater different than freshwater?
 1:04 | cause the salt like takes away the H2O, like you don’t have any extra like…

1:14 | How do you think like in your body, how do you think the salt removes the water?

1:19 | Um, the molecules might like kinda like suck it all in.

1:34 | Alright so the salt might like absorb the water (yeah). Okay, where in your body do you
think that will happen?

1:39 | um, stomach. I don’t know.

1:42 | In the stomach, okay. So if your water is being absorbed in your stomach. Okay, like the
salt is absorbing the water in your stomach. Would it then affect the rest of your body, or would
it only affect you at that point? And is that like…

1:58 | The whole body

2:00 | Okay, it would affect the whole body. Okay, how then does what happens in your stomach
affect the whole body?

2:06 | cause then like, hm. I don’t know.

2:14 | That’s okay, what do you think then, so if I were to drink water, so it goes through my
stomach. Where does it go after my stomach?

2:22 | what’s it. Um…. It was esophagus, stomach, and isn’t it like, um, it begins with a p I feel
like, no the small intestines and…

2:46 | okay, so it’s going to go to your intestines, at that the point if the salt absorbs water in
your stomach what happens in the intestines to it?

2:51 | it like messes it all up, it like doesn’t have any liquids.

2:57 | Okay, so there would be like no liquids left. Okay, so its an absorption issue. So your body
literally could not absorb water? (yes). Okay, that’s interesting.

3:06 | Alright, so, Let me ask you a question. Do you think that is anything that your body can do
that would mitigate the effects of that happening? (no). No, okay, that’s fine.

Interview Three

0:00 | Tell me about your model.

0:02| um, so, this is the sailor dude before he drank the saltwater and then this is him drinking
the saltwater and he like, kinda like died and this is the salt.

0:16 | Alright, why did the sailor die because of the saltwater?

0:18 | I think that it like, like, it like, caused there to not be enough. Because the salt like absorbs
water. (okay) and it caused like there to not be enough water like in the body for him to uh
function correctly.
0:39 | Alright, so the salt takes the water, and since the salt takes the water, is it, does that mean
that the body is not getting that water?

0:48 | it, yeah, the body like, it doesn’t have enough water for it get it.

0:56 | Okay, so where in the, so where after you drink the salt water, where in the body would
this occur?

1:03 | um, I’m guessing in the mouth cause of the saliva and then maybe in the stomach area
(okay), not the liver, the what’s it called…. In the stomach.

1:23 | In the stomach (yeah). Okay, so you drink the water and then the salty water absorbs
water in the stomach? (yes)

1:33 | okay, uh, would what happens then there in the stomach affect the rest of the body?

1:39 | um, so then there wouldn’t, the water wouldn’t be like, it wouldn’t reach every part of the
body (okay), so then it wouldn’t have enough liquid in parts of the body to function.

1:52 | Alright, so it would starve off the rest of the body? (yeah). Okay, um, do you think that the
body has any way to mitigate that happening? (what?). To mitigate, what is happening with salt
water? Can your body do anything about that?

2:09 | um, I’m not sure, maybe.

2:19 | Okay, what do you think that it could do?

2:21 | um, it could maybe like, expel it faster.

2:30 | Do everything it could to get rid of it? (yeah). Now let me ask you a question. Does
everyone who drinks saltwater die from saltwater? ….. Like in our scenario they did, but if you
drank saltwater would you die because of it?

2:43 | Probably not.

2:45 | Okay so maybe not

2:47 | No cause he was already dehydrated.

2:50 | Okay so you think that other factors could also play a role? Like if he was already lacking
water…

2:55 | Cause I think that if you already have enough water, in your body and then you drink
saltwater then it wouldn’t really affect you much. It might take longer for the affects to like work,
like start, but like if your already kinda dehydrated then its like gonna affect you. So maybe that’s
why he died two days later.

3:16 | Okay, do you think concentration matters? Like concentration of water in your body, or
concentration of salt in the water?

3:24 | concentration of salt.

3:26 | Okay, you think concentration of salt plays a role? (yeah)