There are many misconceptions that people have about
chemistry. One that I choose to ask people about is about Ice Cold Lemonade.
The theory is that it is a hot summer day and a little girl pours herself a
glass of lemonade. After pouring it she finds out that it is not cold. She goes
to put in a few ice cubes to make it cold. After awhile the ice cubes started
to melt and she was wondering what made the lemonade cold still. She three
ideas

A)   
The coldness from the ice moved into the
lemonade

B)   
The heat from the lemonade moved into the ice

C)    
The coldness and the heat moved back and forth
until the lemonade cooled off

I choose interview three different people all with different
education back rounds. The first person interviewed was my find Mike Burke, he
is a senior at SUNY Oswego. He is a business major and has not had to take a
science since her got to college. After he read the problem he chooses answer
“B”. After he chooses that for his answer I asked him why he choose that for is
answer. He at first that he thought it was a trick question because he thought
it was a little kids question. After he said that he was trying to think back
to his high school chemistry classes.

The second person is my friend Dave Foley he a senior Bio
Major at Kings College. He also chose answer “B”. I then did the same thing
that I did to Mike I asked Dave why he choose that answer she said that he
remembered from taking physics in college. He also said he knew for a fact that
was the answer because of his past education.

Finally the third person I interviewed was Nick Foley. He is
a junior at Fairport High School. He has yet to take a chemistry class, but has
taken physics. After he read the question she as well chose answer “B”. I asked
him for his reasoning behind that she said ice is endothermic and the lemonade
is exothermic backing the heat to move into the ice.

After doing this small little test I was shocked that they
all got the correct answer. I was also surprised that the high school student
had the most scientific answer to why she chose “B”. It was funny watching them
think about their answer the though because you could that they did not want to
get this little quiz wrong. I thought this was a cool little study on what
people would think keep their drinks cold.