SOCI 211 Chapter readings: Reading Chapter 7
22 Jan 2019
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Because experiments are focused on determining causation, they"re better suited to explanatory than to descriptive purposes. Example: studying the prejudice against aboriginal canadians. We hypothesize that learning about the contribution of. Aboriginal canadians to canadian history will reduce prejudice and we decide to test the hypothesis experimentally. We might test a group of experimental subjects to determine their prejudice against aboriginal canadians. We might next show them a documentary depicting the important ways aboriginal canadians have contributed to the scientific, literary, political and social development of the country. An experiment examines the effect of an independent variable on a dependent variable. A dichotomous variable is a variable that only has two attributes and can also be called a binomial variable. In this example we would see what happens when the stimulus is present and what happens when it is not. To be used in an experiment, both dependent and independent variable must be operationally defined.
