A newspaper reports that students at an elementary school with fluorescent lighting have lower achievement scores than children at a nearby school with incandescent lighting.The newspaper urges a change to incandescent lighting at the first school.This is unwarranted because
A)it is based upon case study.
B)field experiments cannot be generalized.
C)there was no extraneous variable in the experiment.
D)it confuses correlation and causation.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

The newspaper's conclusion that fluorescent lighting is causing lower achievement scores is based only on a correlation between the two variables. There may be other factors that contribute to the lower scores, and it is not just necessarily the type of lighting. Therefore, the conclusion that switching to incandescent lighting will definitively improve academic performance is not warranted.

A Newspaper Reports That Students at an Elementary School with Fluorescent