Setting up a research study?

Question

I am working on a methods paper for a class that we have designed our own research projects.

Here are my research questions:

1. Which gender is less likely to be hired based on weight?

2. Was an overweight person more or less likely to be hired if the interviewer was the same s*x as the applicant?

3.Was an overweight person more or less likely to be hired if the interviewer weighed as much or more than the applicant?

In each question, I have to verify what is the dependent and independent variable.

I believe that being hired (or hirability) would be the dependent variable and gender and weight of the interviewer would the independent variable - but I could also be confusing myself. Where does the weight of the applicant fit in? dependent or independent?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Answer 1

I can understand your confusion!  Your paper is a little bit more complex than you even realize.  However, it is not impossible as you have seen.  All I mean is that you actually have only one 1 dependent variable: hirability and two independent variables: gender and weight.  Each independent variable has two levels.  The first variable, gender, has two levels: gender being the same between interviewer and interviewee, and gender being different between interviewer and interviewee.  The second variable, weight, also has two levels: weight of interviewee being about equal to interviewer, and interviewee weight being more than than the interviewer.