ABSTRACT
One of the most common questions in geographical research and in many other areas of research is whether two or more variables are related in some way. Related in this sense means that, generally speaking, as one goes up the other one goes up as well, which we would call a positive relationship. A negative relationship occurs when one goes up and the other tends to go down. On several residential field courses I have noticed, for example, that Students’ ability to chat to professors tends to be positively related to the amount of alcohol consumed, whereas the quality of the conversation shows a negative relationship.
