Mad Scientist
Walk an audience from hypothesis to findings — hedged, precise, and spoken aloud.
Follow the sequence Spanish-speaking scientists expect: la pregunta de investigación, la hipótesis, method, results, limitations. Say your design the way labs actually do — a doble ciego, dropping the article — and hedge findings like a professional: los datos sugieren que… is the obligatory opener. Mind the Atlantic split, too: Spain says significación estadística and valor atípico where Latin America says significancia and, in lab talk, just outlier.
Below: the research vocabulary lesson by lesson, the Spain-vs-Latin-America terms that trip up presenters, and a way to rehearse a full presentation out loud — no flashcards, no drills.
Say this
Regional Spanish
Textbooks teach one word. Locals use several — pick your region's and stay consistent.
| English | Spain | Latin America |
|---|---|---|
| double-blind | enmascaramiento doble | doble ciego |
| statistical significance | significación estadística | significancia estadística |
| an outlier | el valor atípico | el outlier |
| a working hypothesis | hipótesis de trabajo | mi hipótesis |
Watch out
The part no drill site can do
Olivia
Your vocabulary teacher for this pack
No vocabulary lists to grind — you present. In the Mad Scientist lessons, Olivia is your scientific audience: state la hipótesis, name la variable independiente and el grupo control, and walk her through a study run a doble ciego. She'll poke at your muestra — every lab has heard the joke n=10 no es muestra, es anécdota — so you defend it, then close with los hallazgos and their limitations, hedged the way it's done for real: los datos sugieren que…
Blank mid-sentence and nothing bad happens — she waits. That's the practice, without unnecessary judgement.
Finish the 6 lessons and Mad Scientist is yours — earned, not given.
First 10 lessons free · 10-minute spoken lessons · your AI coaching team remembers you
Quick answers
La hipótesis, la muestra, el grupo control. Grad students shorten the first to la hipo; a reviewer's favorite complaint is la muestra te quedó chica — your sample came up short.
Formally el valor p and la significancia estadística — though in conversation the hybrid el p-valor is everywhere, and Spain says significación estadística instead.
Double-blind — neither participants nor researchers know who's in el grupo experimental. Spoken Spanish drops the article: a study is run a doble ciego. Spain's formal alternative is enmascaramiento doble.
Open with los datos sugieren que… — the standard hedge — and call early results la conclusión preliminar. The seminar-room refrain applies in any language: correlación no implica causalidad.
The dictionary term is el valor atípico, but in Latin American labs and offices the anglicism el outlier wins outright. Pointing one out on a chart, a Colombian might just say ese punto está fuera de la nube — that point is outside the cloud.
