Hypothesis Analysis, Days of Roadkill

My hypothesis was that Saturday would have the most roadkill of any other day. I chose Saturday because I thought that day would be the most people would be out and about and driving places. Also people have work and school off so they are probably driving to go do something fun or visit family or friends. Saturday seemed like to most reasonable hypothesis to me.

My hypothesis was proven wrong. The most day of roadkill in 2009 was Thursday. It maybe that rush hour was big that day or lots of people had after school activities but I don’t really have any idea why Thursday would have the most roadkill. Although Thursday had the most roadkill this year in all the other 2 years the most amounts was on Sunday. Sunday was closer and makes more sense to my hypothesis because it is the weekend and right after Saturday. Wednesday had the least amount of roadkill overall and is right next to Thursday. I think it really does happen by chance.

Overall the results of my data did surprise me. I though the most roadkill would be on Friday, Saturday or Sunday. Many variables could have changed to outcome of the data though. One major one would be if the students that recorded it wrote it down on the day they actually saw it. If a student saw roadkill on Saturday they would have to write it down on the chart in school on Monday. The question would be would the student write down Saturday s date or Mondays date. Many other things could have affected the data as well. It really depends on what kind of year it was. If this year most sports practices happened on Thursday then that could possibly affect the roadkill.  If there was a festival on Sunday that could also effect the data greatly as well. It really all depends on what day something is happening this particular year.

Next year I would look at the kind of things that are going on when we are recording the data. Some things like, special events, school times, rush hour, and after school activities. I think the amount of roadkill really depends on how many people are driving and how many animals are out. I don’t think the day it happened has any major effects.