Social Research

Assignment 12: Chapter 12
1. Imagine you test the hypothesis:
H1: Tall people are more apt to like basketball than are short people.
To do so, you acquire a random sample from a questionnaire of American adults that asked 1) each person his or her height, and 2) whether he or she likes basketball.
Your initial results look like this:
Tall Short
Likes Basketball 65% 45%
Does Not Like Basketball 35% 55%
Total 100% 100%
Using the table above, answer the following questions.
a) Do these results support your hypothesis? Explain.
b) Should you be concerned about spuriousness? What variable might create a spurious association between height and liking basketball? Explain.
2. Assume that you control for the extraneous antecedent variable that you identified in (b). Use the following table to come up with hypothetical data distributions that would support your claim.
These need to be variables that are logically related to height that indicate that the original relationship is spurious due to the variable you identified.
Note: Your percentages need not be perfectly calculated across table, but they should equal 100% as in the original example. You can use the tables below but be sure to replace “Antecedent Variable” and “Category A/B” with the variable and categories you identified in part (b):
Antecedent Variable Height
Category A Category B Category A Category B
Likes Basketball
Tall
Does Not Like Basketball
Short
100%
100%
100%
100%
c) Now draw a diagram that shows the spurious relationship based on the antecedent variable that you identified. If you do not know how to use Word art, you can draw it by hand and use your phone to insert a picture.

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