Modified gravity theories generally aim to solve part of the cosmological constant problem by providing self-accelerating cosmological solutions without a cosmological constant. Such modifications of general relativity also affect the evolution of gravitational waves in the proposed theory. Instead of focussing on an explicit model, I introduce parametric modifications to the evolution equation of gravitational waves in both unimetric and bimetric settings and investigate their effect on the evolution of tensor perturbation modes. In particular, I argue that any modified gravity theory that exhibits growing tensor modes in cosmological evolution can be in tension with experiments. Therefore, parametric constraints for the physical viability of a general modified gravity theory can be found such that tensor modes remain within limits set by observations.

Bachelor thesis