Question

Which one of the following statements about correlation is correct?

If breast feeding and child IQ are significantly correlated, then child IQ must cause breast feeding. If breast feeding and child IQ are significantly positively correlated, then as values on breast feeding increase, values on child IQ must decrease.

One of the possible reasons for breast feeding and child IQ being correlated is that breast feeding and child IQ are both caused by a third variable.

If breast feeding and child IQ are significantly correlated, then breast feeding must cause child IQ.

Answer 1

The correct answer is--

Option-3 :

One of the possible reasons for breast feeding and child IQ being correlated is that breast feeding and child IQ are both caused by a third variable.

EXPLANATION---

We know that,correlation does not always mean causation.,i.e. if two variables are correlated,that does not necessarily mean that,one of them must be the cause of the another.So,option-1 and option-4 are not true..

On the other hand,if breast feeding and child IQ are significantly positively correlated,then, as values on breast feeding

increase,child IQ should also increase..So,option-2 is also not true in this case.

Now,in general,it does not seem that breast feeding and child IQ should be correlated.But,if it is,then there might be another variable,termed as "lurking variable",which might cause the correlation between these two though they are not directly correlated.

Hence,option-3 is the best explanation of this scenario.(ANSWER)