Age and Reaction Time
By Lucas Gehring
Hypothesis
My Hypothesis is that younger kids between the age of 13-14 will have the fastest reaction time. Also I think elderly people will have slower reaction time. I think this because as you get older your reactions start to get slower. When your young, you have time to participate in sports, which gives you faster reactions.
Procedure
The subject sits in a chair.
The releaser faces the subject and holds the “release” end. The subject positions the thumb and pointed finger over the “thumb line”.
After all of that, The subject tells the releaser to start.
Once the subject says start, the releaser may let go of the ruler within 10 seconds.
Once dropped, the subject must try to catch the ruler with the thumb and finger.
Once the ruler is caught, the releaser will look at the number where the subjects thumb landed.
Releaser will record the number and the test should be tested 9 more times.
Once tested 10 times total, Average the numbers.
Conclusion
My experiment proved my hypothesis to be correct. The data showed that younger people have the fastest reaction time with an avg of 1 24.5. In second place was early 20 year olds which was an average of 125.5. Not far behind was 6-8 year olds with a score of 133. 43-47 year olds averaged a score of 145. In last place was 72-78 year olds which was the slowest time. My experiment was accurate by dropping the stick from eye level each time. I could of improved this experiment by doing every age to see which age is the fastest.
Abstract
THINK FAST!
Does Age Affect Reaction Time?
For my science project I decided to do a reaction test. I was very curious since I quickly threw a football at my dad, to his surprise and he dropped it. I did the same thing to my 16 year old brother and he caught it. That made me wonder if age affects how quickly a person reacts.My hypothesis is that younger people will have the fastest reaction time. I also stated that the reaction times will be slower as you age.
To test my hypothesis, I tested 10 people of different ages, including myself. I used a reaction time ruler, which measured in milliseconds (ms). First, I had my subject sit in a chair and I held the bottom of the ruler at their eye level. Next, the subject positioned their pointer finger and thumb where it says “thumb line.” Then, I told the subject, “Within 10 seconds I will drop the ruler.” I then dropped the ruler and the subject tried to catch the ruler as fast as possible. After that, the number that the thumb landed on was recorded. I repeated this 9 more times, for a total of 10 trials. I repeated the above steps on a total of 10 subjects of various ages and averaged the 10 trials of each.
The data showed that younger people had the fastest reaction time, which was the 13-14 year old group with a average of 124.5 ms. In second place, was the 20 year old group, which had an average of 125.5 ms. Not far behind was 6-8 year olds with a score of 133 ms. 43-47 year olds averaged a time of 145 ms. In last place the 72-78 age group had the slowest time of 162 ms.
The results of this experiment proved my hypothesis to be correct. The quickest reaction time was found in the younger age groups, with the 13-14 year olds having the quickest time. Accuracy was kept by having the same number of test trials for each person. To support these results, having more test subjects of varying ages could be included. In conclusion, the findings of my science experiment proved that young aged people have quicker reactions than older people, and reaction times slowed as age increased.