Final answer:
The statement is false; functions do not use variables to store values. Instead, functions use variables to represent changeable quantities and establish relationships between causes and effects, demonstrated through variables in equations, both categorical and numerical.
Step-by-step explanation:
The statement 'Functions use variables to store values that may be stored temporarily or permanently' is false. Variables in the context of functions do not store values in themselves; rather, they represent values or quantities that can change within the function. In mathematics and economics, functions usually establish a relationship between variables. The variables involved can be categorical or numerical. A numerical variable could be something like the number of books sold, which is a discrete variable, or the amount of money received from selling those books, which is a continuous variable. A categorical variable is used for classification, such as political party affiliation, which cannot be meaningfully averaged or subjected to arithmetic operations like numerical variables can.
In economics, functions often describe the relationship between cause and effect. The effect is the variable explained by the function (usually on the left-hand side of the equation), while the causes are the variables that explain or influence the outcome (on the right-hand side). For example, a function may describe how GPA is affected by various factors like study time, class attendance, and test scores. These factors are the independent variables causing the change in the dependent variable, GPA.