Is there a linear relationship between your height and the height of tree in your front yard? As you get tall over time, so does the tree. If you made scatter plot of your height every year and the tree’s height every year, it might look like there is a strong correlation between your height and the tree’s height.

To really understand this relationship we need to look deeper into the data and do some analysis to measure if in-fact there is a linear correlation, and if so how strong it is.

It is also important to note that just because you get taller as the tree gets taller it doesn’t mean there is a causal relationship, or that you getting taller causes the tree to get taller, or vice versa.