2001 Physical and Emotional State Chart

Air Pollution Analysis and Write-up – 2006 (25 points)

Air Pollution lab- Write up Analysis

The key to this lab is thought. It is not a trivial or simple analysis. I expect good data presentation and analysis.

Data for the lab is on my web page under Science 62.

Preliminary:

Check AQMD web page for background on smog (ozone.aqmd.gov/smog/)

Note how ozone levels have changed during the last 10 years.

Which people (age group, etc.) are most, and are least affected by smog?

Write-up:

There are four important aspects to the write-up, data selection, data analysis and confounding variables.

Data Selection: I have already sorted out those students with lots of confounding variables, no variation in readings, and many absences from Claremont. The data you have is supposedly good data As to air pollution there are two sets of data, one for ozone and one for “smog” which is a combination of all pollutants.

Data Analysis: Using regression analysis, it should be possible to graph air pollution levels against physical state of students.

Confounding Variables

There are several variables that might affect data. For instance, student may feel better on weekends and worse on Mondays. You ought to be able to indicate on your regression graphs which days are weekends and which days are Mondays. If either set of data always falls above or below the regression line, you might be suspicious of that variable’s effect. Further, you should try to separate the effect of Temperature from the possible effect of air pollution? Can this be done, and if not, why not?

Finally, what if the effect of pollution is delayed – affects people the day after a pollution episode? you should be able to offset your data by one reading, thus drawing a regression line for pollution against the physical state the day after.

Discussion

Include the following:

Is there any correlation between pollution and student physical state?

If not, why not?

How does temperature relate to physical condition?

Is there any confounding variable that you can think of that might correlated better to physical condition?

You may work in pairs if you wish, or individually. discuss the project with each other all you want.

Instructions for use of excel for graphing and statistics

1. enter all data in columns on excel grid – label columns (Note – this has been done for you). check my web page at

for the data.

2. highlight two columns – then hit Insert in top menu

3. On the insert menu – hit chart – on chart menu – hit scatter

pick the subtype with discrete points –unconnected.

Follow instructions for labeling chart and axes.

4. Now right click on any point on the chart. When the menu comes up, hit add trendline.

ask for Linear trendline on next menu.

5. if you want data analysis,highlight the two colums you are working with and then left click the tools menu – go to data analysis; click regression on the menu; you need to scan your data (column 1 for x axis, column 2 for y axis in order for it to calculate regression values.

example