1. Does Sugar Make Kids
Hyper?
By: Deanna Moyer and Keeley Henry
2. Subjects/ experimental units
● the population examined applies to all children
who eat sugar
● the subjects used in this experiment will be 200
children from the ages of 5-12
4. Treatments Imposed
Treatment 1- The kids receiving this treatment
would be given a beverage with 10 teaspoons
of sugar in it.
Treatment B- The kids receiving this treatment
would be given flavored water with no sugar.
5. Response Variable
We would rate the level of hyperactivity in the
children by using trained professionals to
measure this by using a scale from 1 to 10.
1 being very little hyperactivity and 10 being a
lot of hyperactivity.
6. Experimental Design
We would use a randomized blocked matched pairs experiment.
We would select 50 boys between the ages of 5-12 and select 50 girls between
the ages of 5-12.
We would then put the 50 boys names in one hat and 50 girls names in another
hat. Next we would draw 25 boys names from the hat and 25 girls names from
the other hat. They will be called group A girls, and group A boys. The first 25
boys and first 25 girls selected would receive the sugar beverage the first week.
The 25 girls and 25 boys remaining would receive the flavored water with no
sugar or the placebo drink. They will be called group b girls and group b boys
The next week the 25 boys and 25 girls who already received the sugar
treatment would receive the placebo drink
The 25 boys and 25 girls who received the placebo drink the first week would
then receive the sugar drink
7. Experimental design cont.
100 boys
and girls
50 boys
50 girls
Group A Boys
Group B Boys
Sugar Drink
Placebo Drink
Group A Girls
group B girls
Sugar Drink
Placebo Drink
Randomization
Group A Boys
Placebo Drink
Group B Boys Sugar Drink
Hyperactivity ratings for
each treatment for both
groups
Group A Girls
Placebo Drink
group B girls Sugar Drink
First Week Second Week
Hyperactivity ratings for
each treatment for both
groups
8. Blocking
Blocking was used by separating the boys from
the girls before we randomized the treatments.
We did this because there is a possibility that
boys and girls level of hyperactivity may vary
due to their gender.
9. Blinding
In this experiment double blinding is used.
First we will blind the children by not letting them know
what treatment they have received, to reduce bias, in case
they might subconsciously react to match their treatment.
We will also blind the evaluators as well by not telling them
what treatment the children are receiving,to also reduce
bias. We blinded them since they might make their ratings
of the childrens hyperactiveness based on what treatment
the child received.
10. Concerns
The concerns in this experiment is that there is
lurking and confounding variables that make
skew the results.
Such as if the child has adhd or if they have
had sugar before they went in for observation.
11. Experimental Design Principles
Control- In our design we have control groups. During week one group b boys and group b girls receive
the placebo, and they are the controlled.
In week 2 group a boys and group b girls receive the placebo so they are the controlled.
Randomization-There is also randomization. We use randomization after we block. We do this
by putting the girls names in one hat and the boys names in the other hat and shake them both. Then we select 25
names from each hat. This is completely random because every boy and girl have the same chance of being picked in
the first 25.
Replication-This experiment can easily be replicated with a different set of 100 kids. It is also a must
to make sure our findings is backed up by multiple other experiments so we can claim that the results are statistically
significant.
