Scientific Method

The scientific method is a process in which you form a hypothesis from a question that needs to be attempted to solve. To answer the question you make predictions, followed by testing your predictions and interpreting your results. One question I would like to test is if using tanning beds in your teens, two to three times a week will cause skin cancer. In this case the hypothesis would be that “I believe that using tanning beds in your teens will increase the risk of skin cancer”. In order to test my hypothesis I would have to have controlled testing methods. For instance; I would have a set amount of people to test the tan on that would show some consistence if any in the results. I would ask three teenage girls and three teenage guys to use the tanning bed two times a week for their entire four years in high school. This study would take years to finish conducting because the end results of cancer could possibly not show up till later in their lives. However, I would ask these six people to use the same tanning bed, the 242, for twenty minutes every two times a week they go tanning. They all have to go to the same tanning salon. These would be controlled variables that would help benefit in the results. Let’s say after those four years and around the age that these then young adults grew into mature twenty five year olds would I see what type of results I got from my experiment. Now that I tested my hypothesis, I would now check and determine my results. Let’s say after those nine years two out of the three girls were diagnosed with melanoma and none of the boys had any signs of skin cancer, I would determine that there is an increased percent of teenage girls rather than guys that develop the skin cancer melanoma from using tanning beds at a young age. In lure of this result I would have liked to report this to the health bureau, so they could then add my experiment to their overall study of the effects tanning beds have on human beings. However, the participants were not willing to give out the data so I couldn’t. These two steps discussed were the interpreting your results and addressing the scientific community. They are the last steps in the