SOCPSY 1Z03 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Dependent And Independent Variables, Homicide, The Control Group

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

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 causal relationships between phenomena. Variable: any characteristic or attribute that varies (e. g. gender, age, income) Independent variables (x): a variable that has an effect on another variable. Dependent variable (y): the outcome or the variable that is being caused by the independent variable. Extraneous variables (z): possible other variable that might account for the re- lationship between x and y. Causality (1) temporal order (establishing this is very important) (2) co-variation (association or correlation) But: correlation does not equal causation (3) non-spuriousness (want the absence of spuriousness)