Question

Anderson is reading his morning paper and sees the following headline: "Men Should Avoid Rock Music When Playing Board Games." (This headline is based on a study conducted by Fancourt, Burton, & Williamon, 2016.) In the study, men and women played the game "Operation" when listening to different types of music. Male participants performed worse when listening to AC/DC than when listening to Mozart, but female participants' performance did not differ based on music.

In this study, the researchers recorded how many errors participants committed. This is an example of which of the following?
a. a constant
b. a variable's level
c. a manipulated variable
d. a measured variable

Answer 1

The number of errors that participants committed in the study is an example of a measured variable, which is observed and recorded by researchers in an experiment to determine how it varies with different conditions.

Step-by-step explanation:

In the study regarding how different types of music affect the performance of men and women in the game "Operation", the researchers recorded how many errors the participants committed. This recording of errors is an example of a measured variable. A measured variable is one that is observed and recorded during the course of an experiment. In this case, the performance (number of errors) is the outcome being observed, and it varies among the participants as they listen to different types of music, such as AC/DC or Mozart. This differs from a manipulated variable (also called an independent variable), which is the condition that the researchers change intentionally to observe its effect on the measured variable.