SOCPSY 1Z03 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Dependent And Independent Variables, Stamen, Random Assignment

• School: McMaster University
• Department: Social Psychology
• Course: SOCPSY 1Z03
• Professor: Paul Glavin

Document Summary

Social scientific theories deal with aggregated and not individual behaviour: their goal is to explain aggregate patterns of behaviour that are regular even though individuals within the aggregate vary over time. These theories try to understand the systems in which people operate: the elements of the systems are not individuals but variables. Methods for testing casual relationships between phenomena. Variable: any characteristic or attribute that varies, e. g. gender, age, income. Independent variables (x: a variable that has no effect on anther variable. Dependent variable (y: the outcome or the variable that is being caused by the iv. Extraneous variables (z: possible other variable that might account for the relationship between. Causality: temporal order, co-variation (association or correlation, but correlation does not equal causation, non-spuriousness. When an apparently causal relationship between two variables is actually accounted for by a third variable (extraneous variable: z) An operation or procedure carried out under controlled conditions in order to test a hypothesis (p. 452)