The document discusses four main types of attitude scales: Likert scales, Thurstone scales, Guttman scales, and semantic differential scales. It provides examples of each type of scale and how they are constructed and used to measure attitudes. Likert scales use a rating system to measure agreement with statements, Thurstone scales assign values to statements ranked by judges, Guttman scales use a cumulative approach, and semantic differential scales measure evaluations along bi-polar adjective scales.

1. ATTITUDE SCALE
Dr. N.Ramakrishnan
Prof. & Head
Dept. of Educational Technology,
Tamil Nadu Teachers Education University
Chennai- 600097

2. ATTITUDE
 Attitudes are “the most distinctive and indispensable
concept in contemporary social psychology” –
Gordon Allport, 1935
 Attitude is an enduring disposition to consistently respond
in a given manner. Three components of an attitude are
 Affective – The feelings or emotions toward an object
 Cognitive – Knowledge and beliefs
 Behavioral – Predisposition to action, Intentions,
Behavioral expectations
 In social research, scaling techniques are used to
measure the attitude and behavior. One can make
judgment about characteristic of an individual and place
him on a scale which is measuring for that characteristic.

3. DEFINITION OF SCALE
Originally the word ‘scale’ come from the Latin word scala, meaning a ladder or
flight of steps, a scale represents a series of ordered steps at fixed intervals
used as a standard of measurement. Scales are used to rank people’s
judgments of objects, events, or other people from low to high or from poor to
good.
A SCALE is a continuum from highest to lowest points and has intermediate
points in between these two extremities. The scale points are related that the
first point indicates a higher position than the second; the second point is higher
than the third point and so on.
Commonly used scales in behavioral research include
Attitude scales designed to measure people’s opinions on social issues,
Employee rating scales to measure job-related performance,
Scales for determining socioeconomic status used in sociological research,
Product rating scales used in consumer research and
Sensory evaluation scales to judge the quality of food, air, and other
phenomena.
ATTITUDE

4. ATTITUDE
An attitude scale is a special type of questionnaire designed to
produce scores indicating the intensity and direction (for or against)
of a person’s feelings about an object or event.
Attitude scales are often used in attitude change experiments.
One group of people is asked to fill out the scale twice, once before
some event, such as reading a persuasive argument, and again
afterward. A control group fills out the scale twice without reading
the argument. The control group is used to measure exposure or
practice effects. The change in the scores of the experimental
group relative to the control group, whether their attitudes have
become more or less favorable, indicates the effects of the
argument.

5. ATTITUDE
These are used for measuring the social attitudes.
A questionnaire is prepared; by the items in the questionnaire assess the
attitude of an individual towards a matter, thing, an object or system and
score is allotted for each item.
The individual is asked to express his response towards an object or
system, on the basis of his responses, he is assigned a score which
indicates the position.
Some relevant and indirect statements can also be used to reveal the
attitude.
The scale also specifies the crucial shades of opinions.
Most of the scales used are ordinal in nature, though there is attempt to
treat the resulting data as intervally scaled. The simplest possible type of
such scale has the respondent classifying the object/issue/product/himself
into one among two dichotomous categories.
The attitude measurement scales can be categorised into those which are
unidimensional in nature and those which are multidimensional. The
different type of single dimensional attitude measurement scales which are
available are graphical and numerical scales, summated scales, paired

6. THURSTONE’S SCALE
THURSTONE’S TECHNIQUE Attitude is accepted as an uni-
dimensional linear continuum. A large number of statements of
various shades of favourable and unfavourable opinions. large
number of judges exercising complete detachment sort out into
eleven piles ranging from the most statements to the most favourable
ones. First category each judge places the statements considers
most favourable to the object. Second ,those considered next most
favourable. Eleventh category considers most unfavourable .
Tabulations are made which indicate the number of judges who
placed each item in each category. Calculating cumulated
proportions for each item and ogives are constructed. Median of
the frequency distribution in which the scores range from 0 to 11

7. LIKERT’S SCALE
LIKERT’S SCALE Subject’s response to each item may be
considered as his or her rating of attitude on a 5- point scale.
Strongly agree(SA), Agree(A), Undecided(U),Disagree(D) and
Strongly disagree(SD). The individual gets the score as the sum of
item credits. Collection of a number of statements about the
subject. Items that to be either definitely favourable or definitely
unfavourable to the attitude All favourable statements are scored
from the maximum to minimum. From a score of 5 to 1or 5 for
strongly agree and so on 1 for strongly disagree. Total of these
scores on all items measures a respondents favorableness.

8. GUTTMAN’S SCALE
Guttman applied this model in 1941 that each statement
has an idea relationship of one type or another with the
exacting measurement of the attitude. Study in
investigating a youngsters attitude to career. The item in
the questionnaire which following. 1. Military career is an
attractive and yes no progressive career. 2. Multinational
companies pay a heavy salary yes no Any set of items that
produces a pattern of responses is called Guttman Scale.

9. ATTITUDE SCALE

10. SEMANTIC DIFFERENTIAL SCALE

11. THURSTONE’ SCALE

12. CONSTRUCTION OF THURSTONE’S SCALE

13. ATTITUDE SCALE
There are four main types of attitude scales :
1.Summated Rating Scales,(Likert),
2. Equal Appearing Intervals( Thurstone
Scale),
3. Cumulative Scales ( Guttman Scale) and
4. Semantic differential Scales.

14. LIKERT SCLAES
Method of summated ratings. The likert type of scale
presents
a number of positive and negative statements regarding an
attitude object.
Example:-
If the same preparation is required, the negro teacher
should receive the same salary as the white teacher
SA A U D SD
2 1 0 -1 -2
Negro homes should be segregated from those of white
people
SA A U D SD
-2 -1 0 1 2

15. THURSTONE SCALES
Method of equal appearing intervals.
Scale Value
0.2 I believe the church is the greatest
1.5 I believe the church membership is essential
2.3 I find the church both respectful and
inspiring
3.3. I enjoy my church

16. GUTTMAN SCALES
It is a cumulative technique.
1. The P.T.A. is worth the time spend on it.
2. The P.T.A. is a strong influence for improving schools.
3. The P.T.A. is the most important organization.
Agrees with Disagrees with
the item the item
Score 3 2 1 3 2 1
3 X X X 0 0 0
2 0 X X X 0 0
1 0 0 X X X 0
0 X X X

17. THE SEMANTIC DIFFERENTIAL SCALES
Good +3 +2 +1 0 -1 -2 -3
Bad
Clean
Sweet
Strong
Large
Heavy
Active
Fast
Hot

18. GRAPHIC SCALE
Low Medium High
Personal
Appearance
Social
Acceptability
Speaking
Skills

19. GRAPHIC SCALE
Area of usually Poorer About Better really Not
Competency Low than average than Super able
to
most among most judge
parents students
1.Does this
person
Show evidence
of clear-cut
and worthy
professional goals?
2.Does this person?

20. END