A correlation design tries to find a relationship between two variables. According to Curtis, Comiskey " Dempsey (2015), correlational designs tend to determine if an increase in one variable causes a corresponding decrease or increase in the other variable. In research studies, researchers use various types of correlational designs to determine how one variable relates to another. For instance, in identifying the association between employees' pay and performance, the researcher may decide to use these key correlational designs:
Positive correlational design: In this case, an increase in the dependent variable causes an increase in the independent variable. For instance, a researcher may be interested in determining if an increase in employees' annual pay has an impact on their performances. A positive correlation has values greater than 0.
Negative correlational design: The negative correlational design has values that less than 0. However, correlation lies between -1 to 1, where negative values imply that an increase in the independent variable results to a decrease in the independent variable.
Zero correlation: According to Curtis, Comiskey " Dempsey (2015), two variables are said to be correlated if an increase in one of the variables does not affect the other. For instance, a study may lead to the conclusion that there is no correlation between students’ academic performances and their backgrounds.
Longitudinal and cross-sectional studies are both components of the observational design. Although there are similarities between these two designs, the main significant difference is that each time cross-sectional studies are carried out, a fresh sample is interviewed (Caruana et al., 2015). On the other hand, cross-sectional studies use the same example every time research is done since the same variables are usually under investigation.
References
Caruana, E. J., Roman, M., Hernández-Sánchez, J., " Solli, P. (2015). Longitudinal studies. Journal of thoracic disease, 7(11), E537.
Curtis, E., Comiskey, C., " Dempsey, O. (2015). Correlational research: Importance and use in nursing and health research. Nurse researcher, 6, 20-25.
