Types of attitude scale
Attitudes are measured in scales. The main types of scale are as follows.
Nominal scales
These classify individuals into two or more agree/disagree.
groups, e.g. male/female,
Favourable 1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1 Unfavourable
Figure 4.6 Interval scale.
Ordinal scales
These rank individuals according to certain characteristics, e.g. Yves St. Laurent fragrances according to preference:
Interval scales
These scales have regular calibrations, for example see Figure 4.6.
The advantage of this scale is that it can be used to measure the strength of a particular attitude. It also allows the use of statistical measures such as standard deviation, correlation coefficients and significance testing.
Ratio scales
These scales have a fixed origin or zero point, which permits the use of all arithmetical functions, e.g. measurement of length or weight. Measurements of market size, market share and number of consumers are also examples of ratio scales.
As previously mentioned, the most widely used attitude scaling techniques are the Likert and semantic differential scales.
4.11.2 The Likert scale
Respondents are asked to indicate their level of agreement or disagreement with a series of statements about a subject or an object. The statements used are identified as either positive or negative, and scores are allocated for particular responses. The list of possible responses is usually:
♦ strongly disagree.
Unfashionable 1-1-1-1-1-1 Fashionable
Figure 4.7 An example of the semantic differential scale.
The Likert scale is not an interval scale, so it is not possible to infer that 'strongly agree' is twice as strong an attitude as 'agree'. The scores achieved by individual respondents are only relative to those achieved by other respondents. Likert scales are popular as they are easy to construct and give reliable information about the degree of respondents' feelings.
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