Chapter 1, Problem 1BCC-31

Summary Introduction

To determine:

Why you should not assign causality in correlation studies.

Concept introduction:

Correlational research methods test the relationship between two variables. In such studies, researches are able to examine how two factors are related to one another. However, correlational studies involve no intervention from the researcher, so there is no way to tell whether one factor caused another. Two drawbacks of correlational studies are the directionality problem—not being able to determine what causes what—and the third variable problem, which is the lack of knowledge about other variables that may be at play.