This document discusses different ways to measure variables and concepts. It describes nominal, ordinal, interval, and ratio scales of measurement. It also discusses operational definitions and provides examples of how to operationalize abstract concepts. Finally, it outlines various rating scales that can be used to measure perceptions, attitudes, and preferences including Likert scales, semantic differentials, ranking scales, and paired comparisons.

1. Measurement of Variables

2. How are variables measured?
• Office desk
• Demographic data
• Absenteeism (decision making when who
is to be fired?)
• Blood pressure, height, weight.
• Perception, feelings and attitude
(subjective)

3. Operational Definition or
Operationalizing the Concept
Way of measuring abstract things to
observable characteristics and behaviour.
Concept: Thirsty
Drink plenty of fluids
To determine the thirst levels of each
individuals by measuring the quantity of
fluid they consume to quench their thirst

4. Mc Cleland’s theory
• Need of Achievement
• Need of Power
• Need of Affiliation
Need of Achievement
Measure?

5. What behavioral dimension is
observed within people driven by
high motivation?
1. Work round the clock or driven by work.
2. Unwillingness to relax
3. Work on their own
4. Challenging job but not too challenging
where probability of success is low
5. Progress by getting feedback

6. Dimension 1: Work round the clock
• Working all the time( number of hours
worker in a day)
• Persevere even in face of some setbacks
( nos. of setbacks experienced in task)
• Reluctance to take time off ( how
frequently time off and for what reasons)

7. Dimension 2: Unwillingness to relax
• How often you think about work when you
are away from workplace?
• What are your hobbies?
• How do you spend your time when you
are away from the workplace?
Continuum of who relax very well to who
relax very little

8. Dimension 3: Work on their own
No patience with ineffective people and
are reluctant to work with others
Impatience with ineffectiveness

9. Dimension 4: Challenging job but
not too challenging
Routine or stereotyped job description and
other calling for gradations of challenge
built into them
Those to opt for medium degree of
challenge would have high achievement
orientation then lower or higher ones

10. Dimension 5: Progress by getting
feedback
• Like feedback from superiors and even
subordinates
• Appreciate both positive and negative
by keeping a track on how often individuals
seek feedback from other during a certain
period of time-say a month or more.
Continuum of extensive feedback to no
feedback

11. 1. To what extent you push yourself to get the work done?
2. How difficult do you find it to continue in face of failures or discouraging
results?
3. How often do you neglect personal matters because you are preoccupied
by your job?
4. How frequently you think about ur job when away?
5. To what extent you engage in hobbies?
6. How disappointed you feel on not reaching goals you had set for
yourself?
7. How much do you concentrate on job?
8. How annoyed you get when you make mistakes?
9. To what extent u refer to work with a friendly but incompetent to one
who’s competent?
10. To what extent u prefer to work yourself?
11. To what extent you prefer a job that is difficult but challenging than easy
to routine?
12. To what degree you prefer extremely difficult assignment to easy one?
13. During 3 months, how often have you sought for feedback from
superiors?
14. During 3 months, how often have you sought for feedback from
coworkers?
15. How often within 3 months you have checked with your subordinates that
what you are doing in not getting in their way of efficient performance/
16. To what extent would it frustrate you if people did not give you feedback
on how you are progressing?

12. What is operational definition is not
• Not reasons, antecedents, consequences
and correlates
• It describes observable characteristics
Exercise:
Operationalize concept of Learning and
Stress

13. Scaling
• the process or result of
• observing an event or object
• in order to determine its extent or quantity
• by comparison with a known unit and
• then assigning numbers or any other
symbols to characteristic or feature
• according to some prespecified formal
rules.

14. There are four primary scales of
measurement are
• Nominal (or categorical) scale
• Ordinal scale
• Interval scale
• Ratio scale

15. Nominal Scale
• does not express any values or relationships
between variables
• the only mathematical or statistical operation
that can be performed on nominal scales is a
frequency run or count
• most of the demographic information collected is
in the form of nominal scales
• categories are mutually exclusive and
exhaustive

16. Example
• American
• Australian
• Chinese
• German
• Indian
Every respondent has to fit any one
• Example 1
• Gender – male or female
• Example 2
• Do you use Fair and Lovely soap?– yes or no
• Example 3
• Are you undergraduate, graduate or post graduate?

17. Exercise
• Suggest two variables that would be
natural candidates for nominal scales and
set up mutually exclusive or collectively
exhaustive categories for each.

18. Ordinal Scale
categories have a logical or ordered relationship
to each other (rank-orders the categories in a
meaningful way)
– permit the measurement of degrees of difference, but
not the specific amount of difference.
– only possible to determine whether an object or
individual has more or less or equal amount of
characteristic in comparison to any other – but NOT
what amount of this characteristic

19. Example
• Example - Let there be 3 students A, B and C
who respectively received 10, 12 and 20 marks
in a test.
• The ranks would be – A – 1st B – 2nd
C – 3rd
•
• The quantitative (numerical) difference between
1 and 2 is the same as that between 2 and 3.
• But the difference between the ranks, 1st and
2nd is NOT the same as that between 2nd and
3rd.

20. Exercise
Develop an ordinal scale for consumer
preferences for different brands of beer

21. Interval Scale
• numbers are used to rate and assess objects so
that numerically equal distances on the scale
represent equal distances in the characteristic
being measured
• distance between adjacent points on the scale is
equal
• It helps to compute mean and standard
deviation
• no true zero in this scale

22. Example
Let there be 4 students A, B, C and D who respectively
received 4, 10, 16 and 20 marks in a test.
Is D doubly brilliant than B?
Is A’s brilliance a quarter that of C’s?
The quantitative (numerical) difference between A’s marks
and B’s is the same as that between B’s and C’s
The quantitative (numerical) difference between C’s marks
and D’s is thrice that between B’s and C’s.

23. Exercise
Develop Achievement motivation on the
interval scale

24. Ratio Scale
• This scale consists not only of equidistant
points but also has a meaningful zero
point
• most sophisticated of scales, since it
incorporates all the properties of nominal,
ordinal and interval scales

25. Example
(1) Temperature measured in degrees Kelvin is a ratio
scale. because absolute zero = meaningful zero point
0° K on the Kelvin scale = – 273.15 °C on the Celsius scale
(2) If we ask 2 respondents their ages,
difference between any two years would always be the
same
‘zero’ would signify the absence of age or birth
Hence, a 100-year old person is indeed twice as old as a
50-year old one.
Sales figures, quantities purchased and market share are
all expressed on a ratio scale.
(4) most commonly when respondents are asked for their
age, income, years of participation, etc.

26. Exercise
Mention one variable for each of the four
scales in the context of a market survey
and explain how or why it would fit into the
scale.

27. Rating Scales
• Dichotomous scale
Elicits a Yes or No answer (nominal)
• Category scale
Multiple items to elicit a single response
(nominal)
• Likert Scale Strong subjects on 5 pt scale
SD 1 D2 N3 A4 SA5

28. • Semantic Differential
Bipolar attributes identified at extremes of
the scale(interval)
Responsive__ __ __ __ __ __ __Unresponsive
• Numerical 5pt or 7pt scale
Extremely pleased 7 6 5 4 3 2 1Extremly Displeased
• Itemized rating scale : 5 or 7 pt scale.
Balanced scale with a neutral point
( unlikely & likely)

29. • Fixed or constant sum scale
Choosing the Toilet soap:
1. Fragrance __
2. Color __
3. Shape __
4. Size __
5. Texture of Lather __
_____________________
Total Points 100
_____________________

30. • Stapel Scale: Simultaneously measures
direction and intensity (interval)
Supervisor attribute
The picture of Sony TV is clear
-5 -4 -3 -2 -1 clear +1 +2 +3 +4 +5
• Graphic Rating Scale
How would you rate Sony TV on the following
scale?(ordinal)
Type I: Extremely bad_________________________Excellent

31. • Consensus or Thurstone Equal Appearing
Interval scale
• Multidimensional scaling- conjoint analysis

32. Ranking Scales
• Ordinal nature
• They do not give definitive clues

33. Paired comparison
the respondent is asked to select Aiwa Akai LG Sams Sony
u
one of two items as the n
preferred or less preferred one g
according to some criteria.
Example – For each pair of TV Aiwa ---
indicate which one would you
Akai ---
choose for your home viewing
LG ---
Sams ---
u
n
g
Sony ---

34. Forced Choice
• Example – Rank the following brands of
TV as per your preference for home
viewing (1 as the best and 5 as the worst).
• Aiwa _____
• Akai _____
• LG ____
• Samsung _____
• Sony ______

35. Comparative Scale
• deals with direct comparison of objects or
individuals
• data collected is interpreted in relative
terms
• data have only ordinal or ‘rank’
characteristics
• More Useful About same Less Useful
1 2 3 4 5

36. Many changes continue to occur in the healthcare industry. Because of
increased competition for patients among providers and the need to determine
how providers can better serve their clientele, hospital administrators
sometimes mail a quality satisfaction survey to their patients after patient is
released. The following types of questions are sometimes asked on such a
survey. The questions will result in what level of data measurement?
1. How long ago you were released from the hospital?
2. Which type of unit were you in for most of your stay?
_Coronary Care
_Intensive Care
_Maternity Care
3. In choosing hospital, how important was the hospital’s location?
Very Important, somewhat important, not very Important, not at all important
4. How serious was your condition when you were first admitted to the hospital?
_critical _serious _Moderate _minor
5. Rate skill of the doctor:
_excellent _very good _good _fair _poor
6. Rate one to seven on nursing care
poor 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 excellent

37. Goodness of Measures
• Accurately measure
• Without redundancy
• Differentiate relevant and irrelevant
things
1. Reliability
2. Validity

38. Reliability
Measures without bias, consistent across
time and various items in instrument
• Test-retest reliability (across time)
• Parallel-reliability( changes in wordings
and sequence)
• Interitem Consistency Reliability
(Cronbach’s Coefficient)
• Split-half reliability

39. Validity
Authenticity of experimental design
Cause-effect relationships(internal)
Generalizability(external)
• Content Validity(face validity)
• Criterion related(Concurrent:difference is
clear)
• Construct Validity(Convergent &
Discriminant)

40. Any doubts?
Thank you