Can you anyone help me with this Statistics question?

[battleknight24]

I'm not sure I completely understand the difference between dependent and independent variables...

Here is the question...


A researcher is interested in testing the impact of violent film on men’s ability to solve disputes peacefully. Group 1 consists of twenty-six men who are shown a violent film before being paired with another person from the same group and given a problem to solve. A second group of twenty-six men are paired up and given problems to solve without seeing the violent movie beforehand. The experimenter measures the differences between the two groups in how the men went about solving the problems they were given by recording the number of times an individual used violent or threatening words, as well as the number of violent incidents, if in fact any violent incidents had occurred.
- From the above research statement, answer the following questions:
1. What is the dependent variable?
2. What is the independent variable?

Is the dependent variable the number of violent words and violent incidents? Is the independent variable whether or not they saw the violent movie?

Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Peace,

[Goldeneye]

1. I took stats last semester and its already starting to get fuzzy,

but I think you've got it right. The independent variable is the one researchers can control and the dependent variable is the response to the independent variable.

[battleknight24]

3. Is the control group the one...

... that did NOT watch the movie? And the experimental group is the one that DID watch the movie?

Peace,

[Goldeneye]

5. that sounds correct.

[proud2BlibKansan]

2. It's been a long time since I took statistics

but I think you are right. I also think you can count prior experience as an independent variable. You would have to consider that I would think. For example, a person who was raised in a violent home would be more likely to use violence whether they have seen the violent film or not.

Don't know if this helps. Surely there are some experts here who are more knowledgable than I am.

[slutticus]

4. Googled and found this

http://www.cmh.edu/stats/definitions/iv.htm

Independent variable

A variable that you believe might influence your outcome measure. This might be a variable that you control, like a treatment, or a variable not under your control, like an exposure. It also might represent a demographic factor like age or gender. Contrast this with the definition of the dependent variable. An independent variable is a hypothesized cause or influence on a dependent variable. One way to distinguish these variables is to ask yourself what you are want to learn from this research. The dependent variable is a variable you are trying to predict. Any variable that you are using to make those predictions is an independent variable. A recently published research study examined the relationship of dietary fat consumption and the development of ischemic stroke in a cohort of 832 men who were free of cardiovascular disease at baseline (1966-1969) and who were followed for a twenty year period. In this study, the independent variables were:

percentage of total fat in the diet,
percentage of saturated fat, and
the percentage of monounsaturated fat.

Hope it helps

[DemoTex]

7. Hey! Helped me. Thanks!

I had several statistics courses (and statics courses, but that is another thing, normally paired with "dynamics") at Georgia Tech. That was a good little refresher. I hope it helped Battleknight24. If not, Dr. DemoTex will be back late tonight. She has a PhD in industrial psychology from Georgia Tech, with a heavy emphasis on statistics.

On edit: FWIW, Dr. D will not be back tonight .. her flight was just cancelled out of ORD.

[baldguy]

6. Google is your friend

When an experiment is conducted, some variables are manipulated by the experimenter and others are measured from the subjects. The former variables are called "independent variables"; or "factors," the latter are called "dependent variables" or "dependent measures."

http://davidmlane.com/hyperstat/A29697.html

[mike_c]

8. you've got it right....

The independent variable is the one that the experimenter manipulates (or otherwise observes and allows to vary)-- in this case whether not a violent film was watched. The independent variable is therefore catagorical, with two levels. The dependent variable is the one that "depends" on the independent variable, or varies in response to changes in the independent variable. In this case, counts of violent language or interactions between participants. The dependent variable is discrete since it is count data. The combination of catagorical independent variable and discrete dependent variable will constrain the statistical tests that can be applied to test the null and alternate hypotheses.