Question

Give an example of a study where you SHOULD infer cause from the results.

Answer 1

A chief goal of most research is the identification of causal relationships, or indicating that a particular independent variable (the cause) has an effect on the dependent variable of interest (the effect).  Cause and effect refers to a relationship between two phenomena in which one phenomenon is the reason behind the other. For example, eating too much fast food without any physical activity leads to weight gain. Here eating without any physical activity is the “cause” and weight gain is the “effect.” Weight gain is the result and from this outcome we infer that it might be the consequence of eating too much combined with inactivity.