Associated (vs. caused)
SAT glossary · Reading & Writing
Definition
The word that must survive when interpreting any best-fit slope: the safest reading is that on average, points differing by one unit in x differ by m units in y. Options phrasing the slope as an effect ('studying one more hour raises a score by 2.5 points') overclaim, because nobody assigned the treatment.
Associated (vs. caused) in plain English
When you draw a 'line of best fit' through scattered data points, its slope tells you how two things move together on average — but it does NOT tell you that one thing CAUSES the other to change. Saying 'the slope shows an association' is playing it safe and accurate; saying 'studying one more hour RAISES your score by 2.5 points' is claiming cause-and-effect, which you're not allowed to claim just from a scatter plot, because nobody controlled who studied how much — people chose that themselves, and something else entirely (like natural motivation) could be driving both. The safest, always-correct way to describe a slope is something like 'people who differ by one unit in x tend to differ, on average, by m units in y' — no promises about causing anything.
Also called: vs. caused
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