formulating a hypothesis in geography

GEOGRAPHY GRADE 12 RESEARCH TASK 2018

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1.2.4: Geography and the Scientific Method

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• Michael E. Ritter
• University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point via The Physical Environment

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The steps in geographic inquiry are embodied in the "scientific method". The  scientific method  consists of systematic observation, formulation, testing and revision of hypotheses. If a hypothesis withstands the scrutiny of repeated experimentation and review it may be elevated to a theory. Theories may undergo revision as new data and research methods are improved.

The scientific method includes:

• Observation
• Hypothesis Formulation
• Choose methods of analysis
• Data collection
• Analysis: Hypothesis testing
• Hypothesis acceptance or rejection
• Report results

Let's look at a very simple example of how you as a geographer could use the scientific method.

Observation. During a trip through the Cascade Range of Oregon you notice that the western slope tends to have more lush vegetation than the eastern slope and wonder why. Our experience tells us that vegetation requires moisture to live, and more lush vegetation is found where precipitation is abundant. Could it be that the western slopes are rainier than the eastern slopes given the spatial variation in vegetation?

Hypothesis formulation.  A  hypothesis  is referred to as "an educated guess". That is, upon recognizing a particular pattern displayed by earth phenomenon, the geographer offers a "guess" or explanation as to what caused it. Previous research serves as the foundation for constructing hypotheses. Given our initial observation and past experience we suggest that there is a relationship between slope orientation and precipitation.

A hypothesis is stated in a clear and concise way so that it can be tested through data collection and analysis.When constructing a hypothesis, scientists actually formulate two hypotheses related to their problem. The  null hypothesis  is a statement of no relationship. This is the hypothesis we will either reject or not reject. The null hypothesis (Ho) for our problem is:

H o : There is no relationship between slope orientation and precipitation.

The  alternative hypothesis  is a statement of relationship. The alternate hypothesis is:

H a : There is a relationship between slope orientation and precipitation.

Determine the methods  used to test our hypothesis is the next step. There are a variety of quantitative and qualitative methods to test our hypothesis. One could calculate the average precipitation for the western and eastern slopes and apply a difference of means test ( t-test ).

Data collection.  In order to test our hypothesis we must collect a sample of data. For most cases, a sample set of 30 will suffice.  Primary data  can be collected in the field and analyzed, or secondary data that has already been published can be used. Precipitation data is available from a variety of public and private sources.

Analysis: Testing the hypothesis.  A geographer often starts their analysis using some way to visualize the spatial pattern of precipitation. A map showing the geographic pattern of precipitation can be created if data from several places have been obtained. Or a graph of precipitation with the y-axis scaled for precipitation and x-axis for distance between locations along a  transect . Statistics describing the data are usually calculated. The mean or average of each data set (west side and east side of the mountains) are determined and finally the hypothesis is tested using the difference of means test.

Hypothesis Acceptance/Rejection (Explanation) . After testing our hypothesis we will either accept or reject our null hypothesis. In reality, we can't prove our hypothesis correct, we can only disprove it based on our analysis. That is, we reject the null hypothesis that there is no difference in precipitation based on the data that we have collected. If new data or better data collection techniques are available in the future, they may lead us to conclude that we cannot reject our null hypothesis. Hence it is hard to prove a hypothesis is correct as new information and understanding may present itself in the future.

Report Results. If we can accepted out hypothesis then we can report our results so others can scrutinize our work and test our hypothesis under different circumstances.If our null hypothesis is rejected we can turn to our alternative hypothesis or restate the null hypothesis in a different way. Thus, applying the scientific method can be an iterative process. If our work can be replicated many times under different circumstance the hypothesis can be elevated to a theory. A theory can be a hypothesis or group of hypotheses that has been validated through repeated experiments and coming to the same conclusion.

Assess your basic understanding of the preceding material by "Looking Back: The Discipline of Geography" or continue reading.

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How to Write a Hypothesis

Last Updated: May 2, 2023 Fact Checked

This article was co-authored by Bess Ruff, MA . Bess Ruff is a Geography PhD student at Florida State University. She received her MA in Environmental Science and Management from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 2016. She has conducted survey work for marine spatial planning projects in the Caribbean and provided research support as a graduate fellow for the Sustainable Fisheries Group. There are 9 references cited in this article, which can be found at the bottom of the page. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 1,032,869 times.

A hypothesis is a description of a pattern in nature or an explanation about some real-world phenomenon that can be tested through observation and experimentation. The most common way a hypothesis is used in scientific research is as a tentative, testable, and falsifiable statement that explains some observed phenomenon in nature. [1] X Research source Many academic fields, from the physical sciences to the life sciences to the social sciences, use hypothesis testing as a means of testing ideas to learn about the world and advance scientific knowledge. Whether you are a beginning scholar or a beginning student taking a class in a science subject, understanding what hypotheses are and being able to generate hypotheses and predictions yourself is very important. These instructions will help get you started.

Preparing to Write a Hypothesis

• If you are writing a hypothesis for a school assignment, this step may be taken care of for you.

• Focus on academic and scholarly writing. You need to be certain that your information is unbiased, accurate, and comprehensive. Scholarly search databases such as Google Scholar and Web of Science can help you find relevant articles from reputable sources.
• You can find information in textbooks, at a library, and online. If you are in school, you can also ask for help from teachers, librarians, and your peers.

• For example, if you are interested in the effects of caffeine on the human body, but notice that nobody seems to have explored whether caffeine affects males differently than it does females, this could be something to formulate a hypothesis about. Or, if you are interested in organic farming, you might notice that no one has tested whether organic fertilizer results in different growth rates for plants than non-organic fertilizer.
• You can sometimes find holes in the existing literature by looking for statements like “it is unknown” in scientific papers or places where information is clearly missing. You might also find a claim in the literature that seems far-fetched, unlikely, or too good to be true, like that caffeine improves math skills. If the claim is testable, you could provide a great service to scientific knowledge by doing your own investigation. If you confirm the claim, the claim becomes even more credible. If you do not find support for the claim, you are helping with the necessary self-correcting aspect of science.
• Examining these types of questions provides an excellent way for you to set yourself apart by filling in important gaps in a field of study.

• Following the examples above, you might ask: "How does caffeine affect females as compared to males?" or "How does organic fertilizer affect plant growth compared to non-organic fertilizer?" The rest of your research will be aimed at answering these questions.

• Following the examples above, if you discover in the literature that there is a pattern that some other types of stimulants seem to affect females more than males, this could be a clue that the same pattern might be true for caffeine. Similarly, if you observe the pattern that organic fertilizer seems to be associated with smaller plants overall, you might explain this pattern with the hypothesis that plants exposed to organic fertilizer grow more slowly than plants exposed to non-organic fertilizer.

Formulating Your Hypothesis

• You can think of the independent variable as the one that is causing some kind of difference or effect to occur. In the examples, the independent variable would be biological sex, i.e. whether a person is male or female, and fertilizer type, i.e. whether the fertilizer is organic or non-organically-based.
• The dependent variable is what is affected by (i.e. "depends" on) the independent variable. In the examples above, the dependent variable would be the measured impact of caffeine or fertilizer.
• Your hypothesis should only suggest one relationship. Most importantly, it should only have one independent variable. If you have more than one, you won't be able to determine which one is actually the source of any effects you might observe.

• Don't worry too much at this point about being precise or detailed.
• In the examples above, one hypothesis would make a statement about whether a person's biological sex might impact the way the person is affected by caffeine; for example, at this point, your hypothesis might simply be: "a person's biological sex is related to how caffeine affects his or her heart rate." The other hypothesis would make a general statement about plant growth and fertilizer; for example your simple explanatory hypothesis might be "plants given different types of fertilizer are different sizes because they grow at different rates."

• Using our example, our non-directional hypotheses would be "there is a relationship between a person's biological sex and how much caffeine increases the person's heart rate," and "there is a relationship between fertilizer type and the speed at which plants grow."
• Directional predictions using the same example hypotheses above would be : "Females will experience a greater increase in heart rate after consuming caffeine than will males," and "plants fertilized with non-organic fertilizer will grow faster than those fertilized with organic fertilizer." Indeed, these predictions and the hypotheses that allow for them are very different kinds of statements. More on this distinction below.
• If the literature provides any basis for making a directional prediction, it is better to do so, because it provides more information. Especially in the physical sciences, non-directional predictions are often seen as inadequate.

• Where necessary, specify the population (i.e. the people or things) about which you hope to uncover new knowledge. For example, if you were only interested the effects of caffeine on elderly people, your prediction might read: "Females over the age of 65 will experience a greater increase in heart rate than will males of the same age." If you were interested only in how fertilizer affects tomato plants, your prediction might read: "Tomato plants treated with non-organic fertilizer will grow faster in the first three months than will tomato plants treated with organic fertilizer."

• For example, you would not want to make the hypothesis: "red is the prettiest color." This statement is an opinion and it cannot be tested with an experiment. However, proposing the generalizing hypothesis that red is the most popular color is testable with a simple random survey. If you do indeed confirm that red is the most popular color, your next step may be to ask: Why is red the most popular color? The answer you propose is your explanatory hypothesis .

• An easy way to get to the hypothesis for this method and prediction is to ask yourself why you think heart rates will increase if children are given caffeine. Your explanatory hypothesis in this case may be that caffeine is a stimulant. At this point, some scientists write a research hypothesis , a statement that includes the hypothesis, the experiment, and the prediction all in one statement.
• For example, If caffeine is a stimulant, and some children are given a drink with caffeine while others are given a drink without caffeine, then the heart rates of those children given a caffeinated drink will increase more than the heart rate of children given a non-caffeinated drink.

• Using the above example, if you were to test the effects of caffeine on the heart rates of children, evidence that your hypothesis is not true, sometimes called the null hypothesis , could occur if the heart rates of both the children given the caffeinated drink and the children given the non-caffeinated drink (called the placebo control) did not change, or lowered or raised with the same magnitude, if there was no difference between the two groups of children.
• It is important to note here that the null hypothesis actually becomes much more useful when researchers test the significance of their results with statistics. When statistics are used on the results of an experiment, a researcher is testing the idea of the null statistical hypothesis. For example, that there is no relationship between two variables or that there is no difference between two groups. [8] X Research source

Hypothesis Examples

Community Q&A

• Remember that science is not necessarily a linear process and can be approached in various ways. [10] X Research source Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0
• When examining the literature, look for research that is similar to what you want to do, and try to build on the findings of other researchers. But also look for claims that you think are suspicious, and test them yourself. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0
• Be specific in your hypotheses, but not so specific that your hypothesis can't be applied to anything outside your specific experiment. You definitely want to be clear about the population about which you are interested in drawing conclusions, but nobody (except your roommates) will be interested in reading a paper with the prediction: "my three roommates will each be able to do a different amount of pushups." Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0

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• ↑ https://undsci.berkeley.edu/for-educators/prepare-and-plan/correcting-misconceptions/#a4
• ↑ https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/general_writing/common_writing_assignments/research_papers/choosing_a_topic.html
• ↑ https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/subject_specific_writing/writing_in_the_social_sciences/writing_in_psychology_experimental_report_writing/experimental_reports_1.html
• ↑ https://www.grammarly.com/blog/how-to-write-a-hypothesis/
• ↑ https://grammar.yourdictionary.com/for-students-and-parents/how-create-hypothesis.html
• ↑ https://flexbooks.ck12.org/cbook/ck-12-middle-school-physical-science-flexbook-2.0/section/1.19/primary/lesson/hypothesis-ms-ps/
• ↑ https://iastate.pressbooks.pub/preparingtopublish/chapter/goal-1-contextualize-the-studys-methods/
• ↑ http://mathworld.wolfram.com/NullHypothesis.html
• ↑ http://undsci.berkeley.edu/article/scienceflowchart

About This Article

Before writing a hypothesis, think of what questions are still unanswered about a specific subject and make an educated guess about what the answer could be. Then, determine the variables in your question and write a simple statement about how they might be related. Try to focus on specific predictions and variables, such as age or segment of the population, to make your hypothesis easier to test. For tips on how to test your hypothesis, read on! Did this summary help you? Yes No

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GEOGRAPHY RESEARCH TASK GRADE 12 TERM ONE 2022

INSTRUCTIONS AND INFORMATION

• This task is to be administered and recorded in the first term.
• The task is allocated a time frame of 8 weeks in term one.
• Non-compliance of submissions according to the time frames set CAN result in zero mark for the candidate.
• The REASERCH TASK in grade 12 is part of the formal assessment programme in 2022
• All dates stated in Annexure A are stipulated for completion of the step.
• Candidates must adhere to the due dates stipulated in Annexure A.
• Candidates must always refer to the Research Rubric to gain more insight on the expectations for each step.
• What causes the natural event? (include a diagram)
• Where does it occur? (include a map)
• How does the natural event impact the environment?
• How does the natural event impact humans? social, political, economical?
• How can we prepare, prevent, protect against the natural event?
• How can communities' benefit from the natural event? Is this natural event a concern in my area?

Topics for Grade 12 Research Choose any ONE of the following topics to do research on Climate and weather

• An analysis of weather patterns and data over a longer period in your area.
• Strategies that help prepare for and manage natural weather disasters in the Free State.
• Local climates in your area and its impact on settlements and farming activities
• Pay close attention to the following aspects (Social, Economic, Environmental)
• Effects of Midlatitude/ Tropical cyclones on human activities,
• How cyclones affect the environment and human lives?

Geomorphology

• A study of processes and factors influencing flow patterns in local streams/rivers.
• A study on the human impact on the flow patterns of a river in your area.
• Catchment river management in the Free State.
• Choose a specific area where the geographical statement can be made.
• Where is it?
• What is it?
• How it ought to be?
• Human Impacts?
• Example: what? where? The pollution along the Vaal River is due to the increase in contaminants created by the human settlements.
• Provide a map of the area in question.
• During this stage create a buffer zone around the area of study
• The map must have a key and be drawn to scale.
• It should be a most recent map. 
• Maps can be downloaded from websites
• Identify on the map where in South Africa the study area is located. (This can be indicated on the map)
• A description of the study area in terms of its exact position (degrees, minutes and seconds)
• Provide relevant information about the area, for example population of the area or climate of the area.
• Provide media (newspaper internet/magazine) sources
• Observations
• Field trips
• Newspaper articles
• Government department statistics
• Internet NB: due to Covid 19 restrictions, learners can only use Secondary data sources to limit contact. But the information used cannot be cut and pasto.
• Collected data should now be used to formulate a discussion around the existing geographical problem.
• Represent information graphically (creatively) where necessary, for example graphs, sketches, photographs etc.
• Graphic information must be analysed during this stage. 
• Make recommendations to solve the geographical problem in question
• Present original and realistic opinions as far possible. 
• STEP SEVEN Conclusion - ACCEPT OR REJECT the hypothesis. Make a decision to either ACCEPT or REJECT the hypothesis. Provide reasons for either ACCEPTING or REJECTING the hypothesis,
• List web sites in full.
• Annexures of questionnaires and interviews conducted should be included.

GEOGRAPHY RESEARCH TASK ANNEXURE A

Geographic question/inquiry To complete this research, we must be willing and have an ability to ask and answer

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Hypothesis: Geography

By Keith Kelly

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Keith Kelly looks at examples of the language of hypothesis, prediction and conditions from the area of geography, covering common structures and lexical phrases.

Common structures

Predicting with a greater degree of certainty.

If … happens, … will: If the population continues to increase at this pace, it will double in less than 20 years.

As … happens, (then) … will/may happen: As a country’s economy develops, its population will grow very slowly at first, but will then grow rapidly later and may finally stop growing.

When … happens, (then) … will happen: When the magma cools, it will form igneous rock within the crust.

Because … happens, (then) … will happen: Because the resources are used at a faster rate than they are replaced, they will be run down to levels at which they become of little use to people.

Predicting with a lesser degree of certainty

If … happens, … may / might / can / could happen (possibility):

• If a cave erodes all the way through a headland, an arch may form.
• If many vehicles pass over the sand dunes throughout the year, this can greatly reduce vegetation cover.
• If greenhouse gases continue to accumulate at their present rate, the earth’s temperature could rise by around 3ºC in the 21 st century. Health problems could increase in temperate latitudes as tropical diseases might spread to these regions due to higher summer temperatures.

If … happened, … would happen (probability): If cultural regions were based only on language, they would be relatively easy to define.

Assuming … happened, … would happen (probability): Assuming working hours were reduced, the cost of manufacturing would increase.

If … had happened, … would have happened (speculation about the past): If a similar mudflow had hit a town in a rich country, fewer homes would have been destroyed.

Predicting using a negative construction

Unless … happens, … will not happen / … will not happen, unless … happens: Unless more oil is found, or energy use is controlled, the world’s oil supply will not last beyond the end of the 21st century. The population of the island will not be evacuated unless there is a real perceived threat from the active volcano.

If / When … does not happen, … will happen / … will not happen: If the rain does not fall, it will cause drought, crop failure and famine. When the tide comes in beyond the markers, the fishermen will not be able to lay their nets.

Common lexical phrases

Whether … happens depends on … / … happening requires … (entails, calls for, demands, needs): Whether river erosion happens quickly or slowly depends on hardness of rock, volume of water and river speed. Maximising a crop harvest demands a lot of forward planning and preparation and calls for a certain amount of pure luck.

A requirement (condition / prerequisite / necessity) for … to happen is … / One of the conditions for … is …: Conditions for effective distribution ( to happen ) include access to wide, well-surfaced routes, and airports or ports. One of the conditions for effective distribution is access to wide, well-surfaced routes, and airports or ports.

For … to happen, … is essential (necessary/crucial/vital): For rice to grow effectively, waterlogged conditions are essential .

• Geography & Places

Conclusions and findings: Science

Generalizations: geography, explanations: science, change: science, change: geography, roots: science, roots: geography, compounds: science, process: science, compounds: geography, process: geography, attributing: science, attributing: geography, line graphs: science, line graphs: geography, hypothesis: science, measuring: science, measuring: geography, classification: geography, classification: science, comparisons: science, comparisons: geography, cause and effect: geography, related articles.

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Keith Kelly looks at examples of language used in making conclusions and findings from the area of science, categorized by nouns, verbs, word groups and prepositions.

Conclusions and findings: Geography

Keith Kelly looks at examples of language used in making conclusions and findings from the area of geography, categorized by nouns, verbs, word groups and prepositions.

Generalizations: Science

Keith Kelly looks at examples of language used in making generalizations from the area of science; these can be split into three broad groups: quantity, frequency and certainty.

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