Business Research Methods-

Measurement and Scaling

Recap
 What is Research?
 What it is not, When to avoid
 Selecting a Research Method(Quant vs
Qual)
 Research Design
 E,D or C
 R Ms suitable /available for each type
Measurement
Measurement means assigning numbers to
characteristics of objects according to
certain pre specified rules.
• One-to-one correspondence between the
numbers and the characteristics being
measured.
• The rules for assigning numbers should
be standardized and applied uniformly.
• Rules must not change over objects or
time
Concept /Construct/Idea-how
to measure?
 Height—How to measure?
 Tall(1)/Short(0)
 Rank(with another 10 persons)
 Rate (5=quite tall, 1=quite short)
 In cm/m/ft/inches
 Brand Loyalty/Personality/Attitude
towards Hollywood Movies/ a
Company/New Attendance Policy?
Scaling
Scaling involves creating a continum upon
which measured objects are located.

Consider an attitude scale from 1 to 5. Each

respondent is assigned a number from 1 to 5,
with 1 = Extremely Unfavorable, and 5 =
Extremely Favorable. Measurement is the
actual assignment of a number from 1 to 5 to
each respondent. Scaling is the process of
placing the respondents on a continuum with
respect to their attitude .
Primary Scales of Measurement
 Scale
 Nominal Numbers 7 8 3
 Assigned
 to Runners

 Ordinal Rank Order

 of Winners
Third Second First
place place place
 Interval Performance
 Rating on a
 0 to 10 Scale
8.2 9.1 9.6
 Ratio Time to Finish, in
 Seconds

15.2 14.1 13.4

Primary Scales of Measurement
Nominal Scale
 The numbers serve only as labels or tags for identifying
and classifying objects.
 When used for identification, there is a strict one-to-one
correspondence between the numbers and the objects.
 The numbers do not reflect the amount of the
characteristic possessed by the objects.
 The only permissible operation on the numbers in a
nominal scale is counting.
 Only a limited number of statistics, all of which are based
on frequency counts, are permissible, e.g., percentages,
and mode.
Primary Scales of Measurement
Ordinal Scale
 A ranking scale in which numbers are assigned to
objects to indicate the relative extent to which the
objects possess some characteristic.
 Can determine whether an object has more or less of
a characteristic than some other object, but not how
much more or less.
 Any series of numbers can be assigned that preserves
the ordered relationships between the objects.
 In addition to the counting operation allowable for
nominal scale data, ordinal scales permit the use of
statistics based on centiles, e.g., percentile, quartile,
median.
Primary Scales of Measurement
Interval Scale
 Numerically equal distances on the scale represent
equal values in the characteristic being measured.
 It permits comparison of the differences between
objects.
 The location of the zero point is not fixed. Both the
zero point and the units of measurement are
arbitrary.
 Statistical techniques that may be used include all
of those that can be applied to nominal and ordinal
data, and in addition the arithmetic mean, standard
deviation, and other statistics commonly used in
marketing research.
Primary Scales of Measurement
Ratio Scale
 Possesses all the properties of the
nominal, ordinal, and interval scales.
 It has an absolute zero point.
 It is meaningful to compute ratios of
scale values.
 All statistical techniques can be
applied to ratio data.
 Primary Scales of Measurement
S c a le B a sic Com m on M a rk e ti n g P e rm issib l e S ta tistic s
C h a ra c te risticEs x a m p l e s E x a m p le s D e s c rip tive In fe re n tia l
N o m in a l N u m b e rs id e n tifyS o c ia l S e c u rityB ra n d n o s . , s to P re
e rc e n ta g e s , C h i-s q u a re ,
& c la s s ify o b je cn tso s . , n u m b e rintyg pes m ode b in o m ia l t e s t
o f fo o t b a ll p la y e rs
O rd in a l N o s . in d ic a te thQeu a lity ra n k in gPs re , fe re n c e P e rc e n tile , R a n k -o rd e r
re la tive p o s it io nras n k in g s o f te a ra
m ns k in g s , m a rkmeet d ia n c o rre la tio n ,
o f o b je c ts b u t nino ta to u rn a m e npt o s itio n , s o c ia l F rie d m a n
t h e m a g n itu d e o f c la s s ANO VA
d iffe re n c e s
b e tw e e n th e m
In te rv a l D iffe re n c e s Te m p e ra tu re A ttitu d e s , R a n g e , m e a n ,P ro d u c t-
b e tw e e n o b je c t(F
s a h re n h e it ) o p in io n s , in d e xs ta n d a rd m om ent
R a tio Ze ro p o in t is fixLeedn, g th , w e ig h t A g e , s a le s , G e o m e tric C o e ffic ie n t o f
ra tio s o f s c a le in c o m e , c o s ts m e a n , h a rm o nvaicria tio n
va lu e s c a n b e m ean
c o m p a re d
Illustration of Primary Scales of
Measurement
 Nominal Ordinal Intvl Ratio
 No. Store Pref. Rank Pref. Ratings Rs. spent
 1 Wal-Mart 7 79 5 15 0
 2 FoodWorld 2 25 7 14 200
 3 Reliance 8 82 4 14 0
 4 FoodBazar 3 30 6 16 100
 5 JCPenny 1 10 7 17 250
 6 Subhiksha 5 53 5 15 35
 7 Spencer 9 95 4 14 0
 8 ABC 6 6 15 15 100
 9 XYZ 4 45 6 16 0
Measurement Scales

 Types of scales used in marketing research fall

into two broad categories: comparative and
non comparative.
 In comparative scaling, the respondent is
asked to compare one brand or product
against another. In noncomparative scaling
respondents need only evaluate a single
product or brand- independent of the other
product and/or brands under study.
 Noncomparative scaling is frequently referred
to as monadic scaling and this is the more
widely used type of scale in commercial
marketing research studies.
Assignment
 Diff types of Comparative and
Noncomparative Scales used in Mkt
Research.
Project Details
Project-I
 One of the leading IT companies at
Hyderabad wants to know about the
factors affecting employee turnover in
IT industry.
 Your group is asked to carry out a
research to answer that question and
segment employees on these factors.
Project-II
 Determine the factors and their
impact underlying consumers’
perceptions of rebate in readymade
garment. Find out the segments of
consumers.
Continuum
 a continuous nonspatial whole or extent or succession
in which no part or portion is distinct of
distinguishable from adjacent parts
 a continuous sequence in which adjacent elements are
not perceptibly different from each other, but the
extremes are quite distinct.
 the set of real numbers (including both the rationals
and the irrationals); broadly : a bounded set which
cannot be separated into two sets neither of which
contain a limit point of the other