Chapter 4 Review Questions

Some of the most common errors in causal reasoning are (1) assuming correlation means causation, assuming temporal order means causation, a mistaken or unproven temporal order, (2) failing to identify a spurious relationship, (3) assuming a causal relationship based on a single study, or (4) assuming what is broadly true for a group is also true for individuals within the group.

Theory-building research, also referred to as inductive research or exploratory research, seeks to obtain real-world observations sufficient to develop a simple (parsimonious), generalizable (general), and testable (falsifiable) explanation of the variation of interest; this parsimonious, general, and falsifiable explanation is the theory. Theory-building research may be qualitative or quantitative in nature; qualitative research is particularly useful for theory development, given its emphasis on in-depth, context-specific information. Researchers combine the information from their research with knowledge from other related topics and logic to clearly define their theory, explicitly noting their assumptions. Once developed, a theory must be tested (and retested, and retested again). Theory-testing research, also referred to as deductive research, is research that deliberately sets out to test the hypotheses established by theory. Theory-testing research may also be qualitative or quantitative in nature. With theory-testing research, the researcher collects and analyzes real-world observations to assess if the theory is supported.