evaluation

for and against

• what is the general trend in the data?

• does this support the conclusion?

• correlation doesn’t mean causation - could be due to other factors (name them… - e.g. age, sex, diet, exercise, smoking, genes or genetic factors etc.)

• if SD is provided: comment on if ‘the difference in results is significant’

• have they done a stats test?

what improvements could be made for the method? (give examples)

• sample size to make results representative

• other factors

• natural environment

• different species tested

• duration of observation

evaluate the method

• sample size

• repeats

• control experiment

• control variables

• bias

• duration of experiment

evaluate the data

• always state the overall trend

• is there any overlap in the data?

• is the test group result different from the control group?

• is there a statistic, if so what does it show?

• ALWAYS use data as evidence for your points

evaluate the conclusion

• consider both the method and data to come to a judgement (unless stated otherwise)

• use ALL the info