[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > I have been looking for resources on attitude scale construction. The > methods I have been looking at are things like paired comparisons and > successive intervals. The strange thing about finding descriptions of > these methods is that the only book I can find in print is *Techniques > of Attitude Scale Construction* by Edwards (1957?). In fact, it seems > that nearly all the standard references on these statistical methods > were published in the fifties or before. Summated rating scales (e.g. Likert scales with Strongly Agree/Agree/Not Sure/DisAgree/Strongly Disagree responses to opinion statements) analysed by conventional item analysis and factor analysis methods remain in common use for situations where "objective" data is to be obtained from large samples. However, such scales are limited in that they cannot be used to probe individuals' meanings, perceptions, personal experiences etc. I advise my students to use a combination of methods in order to get various lines of evidence about people's attitudes. For example, one of my students, a nurse educator, developed a four-scale Likert instrument on nursing students' attitudes to the elderly, and also used interviews and participant observation during field placement. References in the area didn't stop with Edwards 1957! Some later texts that I can recommend are Robert de Vellis, Scale Development: Theory and Applications (Sage, 1991, strong on the psychometrics), Robert Gable, Instrument Development in the Affective Domain (Kluwer-Nijhoff, 1986, good on both psychometrics and scale development methods) and the revised edition of the classic A.N. Oppenheim, Questionnaire Design, Interviewing and Attitude Measurement (Pinter, 1992, emphasis on various qualititative and quantitative data-gathering techniques, not on the psychometrics). Hope this is helpful, Paul Gardner > Does anyone know what happened? Did these methods go out of style > bacause they were superceded? > > Regards, > Tom > > Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ > Before you buy. > > =========================================================================== > This list is open to everyone. Occasionally, less thoughtful > people send inappropriate messages. Please DO NOT COMPLAIN TO > THE POSTMASTER about these messages because the postmaster has no > way of controlling them, and excessive complaints will result in > termination of the list. > > For information about this list, including information about the > problem of inappropriate messages and information about how to > unsubscribe, please see the web page at > http://jse.stat.ncsu.edu/ > ===========================================================================
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