Business ResearchMeasurement and Scaling

Measurement and Scaling

• Measurement in simple words is theassignment of numbers or signs to objectsor their characteristics.

Uni and Multi Dimesional Scale

• If there is single dimension underlying aset of observations then it is called aunidimensional scale.

• Multidimensional scales allow more than asingle dimension that underlies a set ofobservations

Classification

Nominal ScaleGender Religious Affiliation Favorite Season

Male = 1 Hindu= 1 Summers=1

Female = 2 Muslim= 2 Spring= 2

Christian= 3 Winter= 3

Sikh=4 Autumn=4

Others= 5 Rainy= 5

Ordinal

Interval ScaleIn a company, if employees are asked to rate job satisfaction on a scale on 1 to 5 where 1 means

completely unsatisfied and 5 means completely satisfied as shown below:

Completely Satisfied 1 2 3 4 5 Completely Unsatisfied

This will be an example of Interval Scale. Since the distance between each point from 1 to 5 is

assumed to be the same, it would be appropriate to compute differences between scores on this

scale. A result like the difference in job satisfaction among morning and evening shift employees

was 2 can be concluded.

Ratio ScaleIf for each of the students, their scores in a test are assigned out of a total maximum score of 50.

Students Score

(Ratio Scale) Ratio

Ramesh 30 60%

Sam 20 40%

Vineet 25 50%

Jaspreet 40 80%

Here the difference of 10 marks between score of 30 and 20 is the same as the difference of 10 marks between score of 40 and 30.Also, a score of 40 can be interpreted as twice the score of 20. Ratios of the score values can be calculated.

Summary

Scales Nominal Ordinal Interval Ratio

Characteristics Order 1. � 1. 1. 1.

1.� 1. � 1. 1.

Differences

Origin� � �

Mathematical = & ≠

Operations < & >�

+ & -� �

X & ÷ � � �

SCALINGTECHNIQUES

COMPARATIVESCALING

NON-COMPARATIVE

SCALING

PAIREDCOMPARISON

SCALE

CONSTANTSUM SCALE

RANK ORDERSCALE Q- SORT SCALE CONTINUOUS

RATING SCALEITEMIZED

RATING SCALE

SEMANTICLIKERT SCALE DIFFERENTIAL STAPEL SCALE

SCALE

Paired Comparison

Cola Orange Lemon # of times

preferred

Orange 1 - 1 2

Lemon 0 0 - 0

Constant sum

Flavor Sweetness Fizz

Drink 1 25 20 45

Drink 2 30 40 30

Drink 3 35 15 15

Drink 4 10 25 10

100 100 100

Rank order

Flavor Sweetness Fizz

Drink 1 3 3 1

Drink 2 2 1 2

Drink 3 1 4 3

Drink 4 4 2 4

Continuous scaleA human resource manager wants to measure the job satisfaction for employees using a continuous rating scale.. The scale can bedeveloped in following ways:

Option 1Very Satisfied

Very unsatisfied

Option 2Very Satisfied

Very unsatisfied0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70

80 90 100

Option 3Very Satisfied

Very unsatisfied

Somewhat Satisfied Somewhat Unsatisfied

Itemized rating scale

1. I like to receive salary bonus on a quarterly basis

2. I like to receive salary bonus on an annual basis

Semantic differential

1. You find your supervisor to be:

Very Powerful Very Weak

Reliable Unreliable

Organized Unorganized

Staple Scale

1. You find your supervisor to be:

+1 +1 +1

+2 +2 +2

+3 +3 +3

Powerful Reliable Organized

-1 -1 -1

-2 -2 -2

-3 -3 -3

Physical Form of Scales

Do you like the orange flavor of this drink?

True Score Model

Xo = Xt + Es + Er

Xo = Observed measurement ScoreXt = True Score of the characteristicEs = Systematic ErrorEr = Random Error

Scale evaluation

Generalizability

Validity Applicability

ScaleReliability Sensitivity Evaluation

Class activity

• “A brand could receive the highest medianrank yet it sales are poor”

• Discuss