Booth Id:
BEHA026
Category:
Behavioral and Social Sciences
Year:
2025
Finalist Names:
Patel, Ria (School: St. Andrew's Episcopal School)
Abstract:
The mental state of students is an area of which we need to draw more attention towards, including Mississippi. Studies show that anxiety and depression are two major mental illnesses students are dealing with in Mississippi, with most of these students not being able to receive help. School factors like testing anxiety heavily contribute to the poor mental state of these students. The objective of this study is to collect data in relation to the possible influence the mind has on the performance of the body in hopes to spread awareness on the deterioration of mental health in students around the world. Through the data found in this study, we hope to suggest that if the testing environment of students was altered to create a more positive atmosphere, it would possibly correlate to better scores in the assessments. In order to conduct this experiment, we placed a mix of roughly 30 students from grades 9th-10th, under the impression that they were taking a test on memory retention, in 3 separate classrooms with a plant in two of the rooms providing positive and negative reactions to the assessment. Once completed, the test averages were calculated in respect to the different rooms and then compared to study possible trends. The data obtained through this study could potentially be beneficial to students taking more large-scale assessments in the future, like the ACT and SAT.
Awards Won: