ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces basic concepts in research. A variable is a quantity in which researcher are interested that varies in the course of the research or that has different values for different samples in their study. The researcher chooses his variables, not the other way around; the world about the researcher does not tell him what aspects of it to study. The dependent variable is that quantity or aspect of nature whose change or different states the researcher wants to understand or explain or predict. The causal direction of the functional relationship—that is, which variable is put on the left side as the dependent variable, and which is put on the right as the independent variable—is a decision that the researcher makes in light of his or her general knowledge of the subject matter. The enormity of the ceteris paribus breaches makes it likely that the researcher will find them out and remedy them.
