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In exploring the relationship between unemployment and mental distress, the reading highlighted some of the difficulties in collecting data on mental distress. They brought up many other variables that could play a role in explaining why unemployed individuals may be suffering from mental distress, such as their marital status. Because of this, it was hard for the researcher to determine the causal relationships and if mental distress was the effect of unemployment or vice versa. I think that the likelihood for reverse causation, and confounding variables are errors for causal inference that are at a much higher stake in observational and survey psychology experiments.

In relation to JN’s post, who asked “can any data be truly representative of the situation it’s attempting to model?”, I think this study would suggests no. It gives you, somewhat, an idea of the relationship explored in the research question, which I think the researcher explored in detail. Although, I still struggle with the fact that data can be representative of mental distress because it varies from person to person and is something so personal to the individual. I think the psychology is a difficult and tricky field in which outside variables can strongly influence data results.