A manager is interested in studying if there is a relationship between the gender of the order-taker and the amount of food ordered. The researcher conducts his experiment in a fast food store for two consecutive days, Monday and Tuesday, between 1.00 p.m. and 4.00 p.m. He calculates the number of orders placed on Monday when the order-taker is a female and the number of orders placed on Tuesday when the order-taker is a male. In this situation, the dependent variable is:
(a) The gender of the order-taker.
(b) The time period during which the orders were recorded.
(c) The store at which the experiment was done.
(d) The total dollar amount of orders taken on each day.
(e) The day of the week when the data was collected.

In this question, the dependent or main variable is the amount of orders taken on each day. The dependent variable is the variable on which the researcher observe the effects of independent variables. If there is any change in the independent variable, the effect on dependent variable also changes.

Here, the researcher observe and recorded the effect on number of orders taken on each day when there is a male order-taker or female order-taker.