Harold walked into his kitchen and noticed that the bowl of bananas he keeps in the corner had many fruit flies around it. When he reached the bowl, he noticed that one of the bananas had its peel partially pulled apart, and the fruit inside the peel had turned brown and a little soft. Harold cut the brown part off and ate the rest of the banana.
As Harold ate the banana, he asked himself four questions. Which of Harold’s questions best transitions into a testable hypothesis?
Will eating a brown banana make you sick?
How do fruit flies affect the color of a banana?
What causes bananas to change colors and soften?
How does banana color change as a banana ages?
How does banana color change as a banana ages?
To determine which of Harold's questions best transitions into a testable hypothesis, we need to understand the nature of a hypothesis. A hypothesis is a proposed explanation or prediction based on limited evidence or observations that can be tested through further investigation. It generally takes the form of an "if-then" statement.
Looking at Harold's questions, one of them is likely to match this criterion:
1. "I wonder if the fruit flies were attracted to the smell of the brown and soft fruit inside the banana peel?"
This question best transitions into a testable hypothesis because it proposes a cause-and-effect relationship that can be investigated. Specifically, the hypothesis could be something like: "If fruit flies are attracted to the smell of brown and soft fruit, then they will flock to a banana with those characteristics more than to a fresh one." This hypothesis can be tested through an experiment where Harold places both a fresh banana and a brown, soft banana in separate locations and observes the number of fruit flies attracted to each.