A dependent variable is a variable whose value depends on the values of one or more other independent variables.
This notion comes up regularly in a variety of contexts. In the case of a univariate function 
,
the dependent variable is 
since its value is directly dependent upon the value of the
independent variable 
.
For multivariate functions 
, the value of the variable 
depends on the values of the independent variables 
.
In an experiment, the dependent variable generally represents the output whose values were altered by causal phenomena--represented by independent variables--in the experiment.
Dependent variables are often referred to by a number of synonyms including response variable, measured variable, explained variable, outcome variable, experimental variable, and output variable. Many of these synonyms are used extensively in statistics.
