Thanks for Visiting the NIH Clinical Center exhibit at the
USA Science and Engineering Festival!

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The NIH Clinical Center is America’s clinical research hospital and the world’s largest devoted entirely to clinical research.

At the USA Science and Engineering Festival [disclaimer], kids (and adults) who visited our booth learned about clinical research, how it works, and how promising discoveries can translate into better health for all.

Walking Through Four Stages of
Clinical Research

At the NIH Clinical Center booth, visitors participated in a hands-on demonstration where they walked through four stages of a clinical study:

• Form a hypothesis
• Collect data
• Analyze data
• Report results

By participating in activities at each stage, kids learned about the work researchers do throughout the course of a study.

Check out photos from the festival!

Form a Hypothesis   

As part of the research process, researchers often form a hypothesis to test their theory about a specific topic. For the study demonstrated in our booth, our hypothesis was:

Kids  9 years and  under would prefer simpler foods and that kids 10 years and older  would prefer more complex foods.   Simple Foods: pizza, hot dog, chicken pieces Complex Foods: wrap, salad, fish and vegetables

To make the results more interesting, we informed participants that we were adding gender as a factor for the data collection.

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Collect Data   

We tested our hypothesis by asking kids to pick their favorite food from a menu board offering six choices:  pizza, wrap, hot dog, salad, chicken pieces, fish & vegetables.  Children received a sticker with a picture of their favorite food.

We collected the data of kids’ favorites by posting their stickers on our Results board. To make the results more interesting, we told the kids that we were recording their gender with their food selection.  We organized the board by age group so we could easily see which food younger and older kids preferred, then we added an initial for their gender. Also, we asked each child a few simple questions about the results on the board to engage them in the data analysis process.  Some kids offered new research questions based on their examination of the data.

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Analyze Data   

The results are in! We had a total number of 890 kids participate in the Pack a Lunch with Punch activity.   Is our hypothesis correct? 

Let’s take a brief look at the data.

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Report Results   

Researchers report the results of their studies by publishing articles in scientific journals.  Other places they share research results include professional meetings, community events, newspapers and magazines articles, factsheets, and websites.  We used this website to post results from our demonstration study, and we’ll share news about the exhibit in the next issue of the NIH Clinical Center News, a monthly newsletter for staff, patients, and others interested in activities of the NIH Clinical Center.  

One place to see research results is on the website http://clinicaltrials.gov/. Search for “results.”

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Get Your Certificate of Appreciation

Thanks for visiting the NIH Clinical Center exhibit. In appreciation, please download your Certificate of Appreciation  (145 KB).

Learn More about Clinical Research and the NIH Clinical Center

For more information on clinical research and how it works, visit clinicalresearch.nih.gov

To learn more about the NIH Clinical Center, visit clinicalcenter.nih.gov

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