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Written by Luka Rubinjoni on 2024-02-20 at 10:57

@jonny Hey Jonny! Would you be willing to share some advice on a very basic experimental design, for a student project? We wish to explore if energy/high-sugar/carbonated drinks impact/reduce student reaction times (measured with Backyard Brains Muscle Spiker + Reaction Timer). The project is aimed to be an exercise in experimental design (neurophysiology is just the research context). The general idea is to measure the reaction times of volunteers before and after consuming the drink. 1/2

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Written by Luka Rubinjoni on 2024-02-20 at 11:05

@jonny We can play with drink selection - Red Bull, sugar-free Red Bull, a local energy drink ("Guarana"), maybe also with a sugar-free variety, Coca Cola, Coca Cola Zero, and local soda without caffeine ("Kokta" + sugar-free "Kokta"). I was thinking in lieu of factorial design and repeated measures ANOVA. We need to work out the details: do we test each volunteer for each drink? Are we bound to just one test a day, per volunteer? Do we measure baseline reaction times only once per volunteer?

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Written by Androcat on 2024-02-20 at 11:55

@rubinjoni Not a pro, but since neurostimulants are chemicals that persist in the system for a while, I think your students should be able to work out a reasonable limitation on how often a person can be tested without cross-contamination.

Other potential calibration questions : Getting used to the experiment.

Is the experiment more or less reliable when it feels novel to the subject?

If subjects do get used to the experiment, would it be expected to override the potential impact of the stimulants?

Is it interesting to see if people get used to the impact of the stimulant also?

And for the theory part: How long should be expected to pass between ingestion and measurable impact?

@jonny

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Toot

Written by Luka Rubinjoni on 2024-02-21 at 11:40

@androcat @jonny Training is, of course, a factor. Habituation to energy drinks is another. Lots of things to consider. I'm thinking of just randomly assigning students to treatment groups, and doing a simple one way ANOVA to see if any treatment had significant effect...

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