Identifying Variables
By now you should have studied material on variables and purpose statements. Below is an exercise to provide a practical application to ensure you can identify purpose statements and variables in a published study. The study is linked below.
While reading it, attempt to do the following:
1. Identify the purpose of this study.
2. List all variables included in the study.
3. Identify which variables are independent and dependent.
Some may have trouble identifying all variables in the study. Below are a few tips.
a. Don’t confuse categories of a variable with the variable itself. For
example, in this study the authors refer to good and poor readers. Are these
variables? No, good and poor are categories of the variable reading level.
b. A study may contain many independent variables (IVs) and dependent variables
(DVs).
c. Look in the Method section of a report to learn how variables are defined and
measured. Usually there will be a subsection of the Method entitled Variables,
Measures, Scales, or something similar; normally details of variable measurement
will be provided in this subsection.
d. Sometimes authors use a generic, catch-all term to describe several
variables. For example, in this study the authors may use the term “behavior” to
describe more than one variable examined. In such situations the catch-all term
is not the variable but just a simple way to refer to a cluster of variables.