You conduct a study in which male and female research participants work on word puzzles. Half of the participants are told the puzzles are easy and half are told that the puzzles are hard. You find that women solve more puzzles than do men. You also find that people solve more puzzles when they are told they are easy rather than hard. Both differences are statistically significant. Thus, you could correctly conclude that

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The correct conclusion is that giving different information about puzzle difficulty causes differences in performance, as this is a manipulated variable in the study design, allowing for causal inferences. The study directly manipulated the perceived difficulty of the puzzles and found a significant effect on performance, indicating causality. However, the study does not manipulate gender, so it cannot conclude causality between gender and performance, only an association.

You Conduct a Study in Which Male and Female Research