COMM88 University of California Defining Variables Questions

Exercise: Defining Variables

1-2 pages

double spaced

This exercise is designed to help you move from reading and evaluating research literature to writing hypotheses and conceptualizing and operationalizing your own group’s concepts/variables. First you will practice by looking at what the published researchers have done, and then you’ll try it with your own study’s variables.

Think about the study you read for the exercise on Understanding Published Studies ( I attached the file)

1. What were some of the specific concepts/variables that were investigated? Which ones were the IVs? …the DVs?

2. How did the researchers conceptualize each IV and DV in their literature review? How did the researchers get from their literature review to the main hypotheses or research questions that involved these variables?

3. How did the researcher operationalize each of these concepts as variables (i.e., how did they actually manipulate the IV(s), how did they measure the DV(s))? What are the pros and cons of operationalizing these variables this way? Can you think of a betterway to measure any of the variables?