Question

Does eating while driving make an accident more likely? Researchers from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration looked at national traffic and accident records from a recent year for those drivers who were eating versus those who were not. Result: The odds of an accident were 80 percent higher when eating than when not.

An example of a lurking variable that might affect the results of this study is:

a. whether the subject had an auto accident.

b. whether the subject was eating.

c. whether the subject was talking to a passenger in the car.

d. whether the subject owned a cell phone.

Answer 1

we know that lurking variable is a variable which is neither resonse variable nor explanatory variable, but it can affect the relationship between response and explanatory variable.

In this case, response variable is odds of an accident and explanatory variable is eating while driving.

Option C is correct answer because talking to a passenger while driving the car is a lurking variable, i.e. it is lurking variable because talking to passenger while driving the car affect the odds of an accident.

So, answer is option C.

Option A and B are incorrect because option A is response variable and option B is explanatory variable.

Option D is also incorrect because owning a cell phone has no impact on odds of an accident.