POL322Y5- Midterm Exam Guide - Comprehensive Notes for the exam ( 28 pages long!)
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Independent variable (x: explanatory variable, the cause and factor of the phenomenon. We should however remain open to the possibilitary that there is still a test out here that will provide evidence that makes us lose confidence in the theory: theory hypothesis analysis, althernative hypothesis. If our theory survives multiple empirical tests we gain more confidence in our theory. It is desirable for a theory to have many observatble implications (we can derive many different hypotheses) In social science the causal relationship is probabilistic rather than deterministic: value of (cid:454) does(cid:374)"t (cid:374)e(cid:272)essaril(cid:455) deter(cid:373)i(cid:374)e (cid:448)alue of (cid:455) dire(cid:272)tl(cid:455) in terms of exact data, ho(cid:449)e(cid:448)er, the o(cid:448)erall rate of (cid:272)ha(cid:374)ge is still (cid:272)o(cid:374)sta(cid:374)t, so it"s probabilistic. We normally investigate our theories but while we can gain confidence in them, we can never prove them: multiple empirical tests favouring the theory will cause us more confidence in our theories. Assignment: causal theory find independent, dependent variables, why independent variables cause dependent variables.
