A researcher wants to know whether writing an essay on a controversial topic will have an effect on the attitudes held by people.First,she administers an attitude survey that covers a number of topics,including electronic voting machines.She then randomly assigns subjects to write an essay either supporting or opposing electronic voting machines.One week later,she administers the same attitude survey and compares those responses to the responses from the first time the survey was administered.In this experiment,the independent variable IV)is .

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

The independent variable is the essay, as it is the factor that is manipulated by the researcher to observe its effect on the dependent variable, which is the change in attitudes.

A Researcher Wants to Know Whether Writing an Essay on a Controversial