Lecture Research methods - Chapter 7 presents the following content: Introduction; concepts, constructs and measurement; levels of measurement; criteria for assessing measurement scales; preparing, inputting and checking data; exploring data; presenting data. | Measurement of Data Samuel K. Frimpong (PhD) Outline of Presentation Introduction Concepts, Constructs and Measurement Levels of Measurement Criteria for Assessing Measurement Scales Preparing, Inputting and Checking Data Exploring Data Presenting Data Introduction In the social and behavioural sciences, it is not unusual for a researcher to engage participants or respondents in a way that will help him or her to ascertain and describe the respondents feelings, attitudes, opinions, and evaluations in some measurable form. The process of assigning numbers to various attributes of people, objects or concepts is known as measurement and this is our primary concerned in this lecture. Concept and Measurement A concept is a mental abstraction or idea formed by the perception of some phenomena. Examples of concepts in business include job satisfaction, job commitment, brand awareness, brand loyalty, service quality, image, risk, channel conflict, empathy, and so on. Measurement involves . | Measurement of Data Samuel K. Frimpong (PhD) Outline of Presentation Introduction Concepts, Constructs and Measurement Levels of Measurement Criteria for Assessing Measurement Scales Preparing, Inputting and Checking Data Exploring Data Presenting Data Introduction In the social and behavioural sciences, it is not unusual for a researcher to engage participants or respondents in a way that will help him or her to ascertain and describe the respondents feelings, attitudes, opinions, and evaluations in some measurable form. The process of assigning numbers to various attributes of people, objects or concepts is known as measurement and this is our primary concerned in this lecture. Concept and Measurement A concept is a mental abstraction or idea formed by the perception of some phenomena. Examples of concepts in business include job satisfaction, job commitment, brand awareness, brand loyalty, service quality, image, risk, channel conflict, empathy, and so on. Measurement involves assigning numbers to a phenomenon according to certain rules that reflect the characteristics of the phenomenon being measured. Measurement Process The measurement process involves specifying the variables that serve as proxies for the concepts (constructs). A proxy is a variable that represents a single component of a larger concept and, taken together, several proxies (indicator variables) are said to measure a concept. Scale Scaling is the branch of measurement that involves the construction of an instrument that associates qualitative constructs with quantitative metric units. A scale is a measurement tool that can be discrete or continuous. Discrete scales measure only direction, but continuous scales measure both direction and intensity. In many ways, scaling remains one of the most arcane and misunderstood aspects of social research measurement. And, it attempts to do one of the most difficult aspect of research tasks -- measure abstract concepts. Steps in Developing a Scale .
