In a variety of contexts, exogeny or exogeneity () is the fact of an action or object originating externally. It contrasts with endogeneity or endogeny, the fact of being influenced within a system. Economics In an economic model, an exogenous change is one that comes from outside the model and is unexplained by the model. Such changes of an economic model from outside factors can include the influence of technology, in which this had previously been noted as an exogenous factor, but has rather been noted as a factor that can depict economic forces as a whole. In economic sociology, Project IDEA (Interdisciplinary Dimensions of Economic Analysis) gave notion to understanding the exogenous factors that play a role within economic theory. Developed from the International Social Science Council (ISSC) in the year of 1982, Project IDEA was founded to gather ideas from economists and sociologists in order to conceptualize what economic sociology incorporates, as they have sought to understand why these two fields have been estranged from each other. Such exogenous factors in economic theory include laws placed in economic systems by governments, ranks of social classes in populations, and preferences based on social factors of an individual. Exogenous Factors in Econometrics In econometrics, an endogenous random variable is correlated with the error term in the econometric model, while an exogenous variable is not. However, exogenous variables aid in the explanation of endogenous variable variances. In the preset group, it is typical to include historical values of endogenous variables. Exogenous variables are independent of the model's disturbance term, since they are preset. They meet the same conditions as explanatory variables do in a traditional regression model. Biology and Medicine Biology An exogenous contrast agent, in medical imaging for example, is a liquid injected into the patient intravenously that enhances visibility of a pathology, such as a tumor. An exogenous factor is any material that is present and active in an individual organism or living cell but that originated outside that organism, as opposed to an endogenous factor. In the origins of diseases, exogenous factors, namely those that are factors of inflammation or stress, such as overexertion, overeating, and extreme feelings of emotions of grief or anger, all contribute to exhaustion or modifications in genes. An accumulation of such stressors affect the immune system by disrupting the amount of communication that occurs between the immune system and other areas of the