marginal calls on the flop & varience

[Cincy Peach]

I would appreciate feedback on my thinking here . . . Parameters: this question is based on my play of mostly live games around 5/10. Games tend to be loose and passive until the turn. I should also point out that I don't have a 300 BB designated bankroll, so my ROR is a serious consideration. My question has to do with selecting which hands to continue with after the flop.

When trying to determine weather to continue after the flop, I basically count the outs and continue if my pot equity (outs/47) exceeds the cost of staying in the pot. For a long time I would call with slighty inferior odds because of the 'implied pot odds' (i.e. maybe the pot was only nine small bets, which doesn't pay for a gutshot, but if I hit I would collect more bets.)

Recently I have leaned more toword folding these hands, with the idea that this group of hands raises EV only slightly, but raises Varience dramatically. (And, raising varience lowers EV because you have play at a lower limit.)

Another type of hand that happens often is something like (an overcard + a backdoor gap straight + a backdoor nut flush) Four-out or Five-out hands like this should have +EV to continue if there are ten or more bets in the pot and I can stay in for one bet, but again, I find myself leaning towards folding these hands because the slight +EV has such a high varience cost.

Has anyone really addressed the EV vs Variance question in depth? Any feedback would be appreciated -