Reference no: EM133617418

Assignment: Correlations

Answer the following questions:

Question I. What is the definition of a correlation and why would a researcher be interested in using this type of analysis?

Question II. What is another name for a Positive relationship and a Negative relationship?

Question III. Describe the association between two variables when the relationship is Negative.

Question IV. Is a correlation a good way to determine cause-and-effect? Why or why not?

Question V. When a large number of cases are examined and a positive relationship is found, what else should one expect to find?

Conduct a correlational analysis on the following example.

Example: A school psychologist is interested in determining if test anxiety is affecting her students' performance on their exams. She randomly selected 103 students from her school and conducted a correlational analysis to try and answer her question. She hypothesized that as anxiety increases, test performance decreases.

Based on this example answer the following questions: (5 points)

Question I. Why is a correlational analysis the most appropriate technique to test her hypothesis?

Question II. Use the data set provided and conduct a Bivariate Correlational Analysis using SPSS.

Hint: In the Bivariate Correlations dialogue box in SPSS, select Pearson. Create a Simple Scatterplot with Exam Performance on the Y-axis and Exam Anxiety on the X-axis.

Question III. Observe and briefly explain the trend seen in the Scatterplot (1-2 sentences).

Question IV. What is the strength and direction of the relationship between Performance and Anxiety?

Question V. Based on these findings, can she infer that one variable Causes the other (i.e., cause-and-effect)? Why or why not?

Question VI. Discuss the findings using Morgan et al. (2002) pp. 33-34.

Provide examples of the following using variables and a made up correlation to illustrate your point: (5 points)

1. Strong positive (direct) correlation

Construct your response like the example given here: A strong positive correlation exists between study time and GPA (r = .74). That is, as study time increases so does GPA.

2. Weak positive correlation

3. Strong negative (inverse) correlation

4. Weak negative correlation