Margaret, a researcher, desires to conduct a field experiment to determine the effects of a shopping mall's ambience on consumer purchase behavior. However, she has to deal with other influencing factors such as noise, crowd, and space distribution. She desires to avoid them by using randomization. In this context, noise, crowd, and space are _____ variables.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

Noise, crowd, and space are extraneous variables, which are variables that can affect the dependent variable but are not of primary interest in the study. To avoid their influence, Margaret can use randomization, which is a technique that randomly assigns participants to different conditions or treatments, to ensure that each group has an equal chance of being exposed to the extraneous variables. Internal variables refer to variables that are of primary interest in the study and are typically controlled for, while construct variables refer to abstract concepts that are measured indirectly. Linear variables refer to variables that have a linear relationship with the dependent variable.

Margaret, a Researcher, Desires to Conduct a Field Experiment to Determine