Biology Extended Experimental Investigation... I want to do Animal Behaviour somehow... any Ideas??

Question

So basically its a Extended Prac and we're allowed to do anything and i really want to do animal behaviour (the whole reason i took biology in the first place) but i don't know how im gunna do Animal behaviour without it turning into like a thesis length assignment, ie. keeping it to a yr12 standard not pro... i dont know if that makes sense but yeah :P Ideas would be VERY appreciated :)

The task is : "You are to undertake a scientific research project on a topic of your choice." pretty vague huh... so it has to include like experiments/trials... stuff we can make conclusions from etc. so I dunno wat u can do with animals and their behaviour that limits the millions of variables and allows u to make specific conclusions... and something that isnt goin to take a year to do.......... :S

Answer 1

It depends pretty much on the lenght of your Investigation and the setting you have in mind for it. What I mean is, that you could be observing animals in their own environment or analyse the behaviour of animals in a special setting. A good example of the latter is the investigation of rodent behaviour with regards to learning and remebering tricks. Such as designing a device that releases nuts or treats when they press a lever and note how long it takes them to learn to do so (very short time for rats - much longer gor hamsters!). The you could change the chain of events that leads to the release of food, and so on.
Just an idea for lab or pet animals!

As for animals in the wild, I think birds would be great to observe. If you have any swallows in the region where you live, they tend to prepare the nest and get ready to breed in this time of year. You could be observing them at "work", they have a very "special" routine. Did you know that they come back and breed in the same spot every year? And that the "children" tend to nest close to their parents?

Anyway, just look around you, I am sure you'll think of something!

Answer 2

Look into B.F. Skinner, and also Pavlov...who were famed animal behaviorists.

See if you can first draw some ideas from what their tack on it all was, see?

Then do something, for example, that will corroborate what they found.

Say, if you have a dog or cat or bird..., do something,try something with it and look for some indication you observe that agrees or disagrees with what they found.

'Doesn't matter if you agree or not, just give explanation for why or why not, for all you will be doing is no more than what Skinner or Pavlov did -- you observe, speculate, and try to present something "precise" (repeatable). Be brave, that's all.

And then own what you say... Be as convinced as my girl K. McPhee is with her songs.

Then write on this -- and -- you can give added enhancement by using your cell phone camera, see?, or something inexpensive that an audience can see as well to help them understand -- be creative..

The pictures you take, whether from a video camera or not will provide you with the always appreciated " visual aids " or " graphics " that teachers and professors and academicians like to see students use.

If you don't have good computer graphic skills, then use artistic graphic skills. Intention with sincere interest is everything and will be picked up by the teacher or audience who observes your work...

Answer 3

K.I.S.S...keep it simple stupid. You can get overwhelmed with this I know. Try using insects eg locusts, woodlice as they are easy to get (but not as exciting as mammals) and use and you can get lots of them.

Chose a simple variable such as light, temperature, soil type preference, humidity.
You can make little chamber with different conditions ie. very low humidity, low humidity, high humidity and have a central chamber and possibly interconnected outer chambers to make it easier for the insects to move through. See how many move to a particular chamber.(this is also where you can trial to figure out how many variations of your variable you need).
With a large number of insects you can get reliable results and you can repeat them reasonably easily too. You can put a time limit on it and see how many move to which chamber (ie. you may only have 3 chambers) after 5, 10 and 30 mins or just have 1 time to get 1 total (ie how many are in each chamber at 10mins). Don't forget to repeat it at least 3 times and preferably more if you don't have many.

They may not be the most pretty of things but are jolly good experiemental subjects, especially for your age. I am sure there are LOTS of websites on this type of experiement...have a look too