Problem:
The way the human mind works, taking experiences, memories, knowledge and learning and compartmentalizing and storing into sections with the brain is truly a science. Taking this everyday day thinking and conceptualizing a storage place in the mind helps to grow our knowledge and the thought process involved. For scientific thinking, concepts involve the creation of building blocks of understanding of the world around us. Jaccard and Jacoby (2010) contend concepts are central to the process of all thinking and can be abstract, encompassing, learned, shared, functional, and selective. For example, the concept of a car, can involve a myriad of building blocks of knowledge and growth such as the way a car looks, feels, or drives at various stages of human development. As a young child, the concept of a car could be the little shiny toy that moves when they slide the car across the floor. As the child grows, the concept of car expands into the big thing you sit in that drives and steers with a wheel. The fact being the concept of car grows with knowledge and development of real and functional understanding.
Constructs are a higher degree of ideas or theory built from a compilation or cluster of concepts (Jaccard & Jacoby, 2010, p. 13). For example, nuts, bolts and nails are all concepts that combined could be parts of a toolbox. Therefore, the relationship between concepts and constructs hinges on being mutually inclusive and having a generalized abstract or idea applied over various circumstances. The construct of toolbox can include hammers, screwdrivers and more. Instead of listing everything that goes into a toolbox, the construct is the toolbox or manipulated can be description of Home Depot. Either way, constructs are grounded in theory and less about facts.
For scientific purposes, constructs can also contain varying degrees of variables, levels and values that are subject to control, manipulation and measurement. Variables help us to navigate constructs through the test of theory (construct) and applying to reality and fact. Jaccard and Jacoby (2010, p. 13) contend variables are central to the study of social science theories and differ depending on the level and categories in which placed. Variables can give credence to or debunk theory (construct).