Question

An investigator was interested in studying the effect of taking a course in child development upon attitudes toward childrearing. At the end of the semester, the researcher distributed a questionnaire to students who had taken the child development course. Questionnaires were also given to an equal number of students who had not taken the course. The students who had taken the child development course had different attitudes from the students who had not taken the course (e.g., they had more positive attitudes about having large families).
A) Identify the independent variable(s).
B) Identify the dependent variable(s).
C) Identify any confounding variable(s).
D) Propose a method to "unconfound" the experiment.

Answer 1

Answer:

The answers are:

A) taking of the child development course (independent variable)

B) attitudes towards child bearing (dependent variable)

C) family background of participant (confounding variable)

D) participants should have similar family backgrounds

Step-by-step explanation:

I will explain each of the choices one after the other

A) An Independent Variable is one that is completely under the control of the experimenter, that is a variable that the experimenter manipulates and assigns value at will. In this example, the the experimenter chooses who takes and who doesn't take the course, and the course content too, hence the taking of the child bearing course is an example of an independent variable.

B) The dependent variable is one whose outcome completely based on the effect of the independent variable. It is what the experimenter sets out to observe when manipulating the independent variable. It can be said to be the aim of the experiment. In this example, the attitudes towards child bearing is a direct outcome, associated with the taking of the course on child bearing, hence it is the dependent variable. Also, the experimenter has no direct manipulative control on this variable.

C) A confounding variable is one that has a similar effect on the dependent variable as the independent variable if left unaccounted for during the course of the experiment. In this example, participants that came from families that are large, may be culturally inclined to love large families, hence whether they take the child development course or not, their family background will definitely influence their judgement in the questionnaire, while the reverse is the case for participants coming from families that are small in number. On the other hand also, participants can detest the kind of family background they came from, hence affecting their judgement irrespective of the course. For example, a participant from a small family unit; maybe an only child may have been too lonely and depressed during his/her development, hence will hate small family units

D) A method of unconfounding the experiment is to set out inclusion and exclusion criteria, to unify the family background of the participants, in order to remove this bias.