Thursday, April 17, 2014

SCALES OF MEASURING ATTITUDES

Attitudes are generally measured by using scales. Each scale contains several items (sentences) and measures a specific aspect of an object whose attitude is being measured. Most scales act as indirect measures of various components (cognitive, affective or conative) of attitudes. Direct questions or probing may not reveal true attitudes of consumers towards objects such as brand image, corporate image, perceptions about salespersons etc. 
The most commonly used scales for measuring attitudes are the Likert scale and the Semantic Differential Scale. 
Semantic Differential Scale :The Semantic Differential (SD) scale measures consumers’ reactions to stimulus words and concepts in terms of ratings of bipolar scales defined with contrasting adjectives at each end. Such a semantic differential scale is given below. 
Usually, the position market 0 is labeled “neutral,” the 1 position are labeled “slightly,” the 2 positions “quite,” and the 3 positions “extremely.” A scale like this one measures directionality of a reaction (e.g. good versus bad) and also intensity (slight through extreme). Typically, a person is presented with the some object of interest, e.g. Nescafe (as a brand) , and asked to rate it on a number of scales. Ratings are combined in different ways to describe and analyze the person’s feelings.
  • Bipolar adjective scales are a simple, economical ways of obtaining data on people’s reactions. With adaptations, such scales may be applied to adults or children, people from all walks of life, and individuals from any culture.
  • Ratings on bipolar adjective scales tend to be correlated and three basic dimensions of the co-variation in ratings labeled as Evaluation, Potency and Activity (EPA), have been verified and replicated in a variety of studies.
  • Some adjective scales are almost pure measures of the EPA such as good-bad for evaluation, powerful to powerless for Potency and fast to slow for activity. Using pure scales of this kind, the investigator can obtain with a single dimension, and he can average the results to provide a single factor score for each dimension. Measurements of a concept of the EPA dimensions are referred to as the concept’s profile. 
  • EPA measurements are appropriate when one is interested in affective responses. The EPA system is a generalized approach, applied to any concept or stimulus. Thus it permits comparisons of affective reactions to various objects. EPA ratings have been obtained for hundreds of advertisements, communications, brands, customer experiences, role stereotypes, organizations, colors, sounds, shapes, and individuals.

Likert Scale: Likert scale typically allows respondents to rate the level at which they agree or disagree with a particular item. As   I find this software user friendly.  Strongly Disagree        1 2 3 4 5 6 7       Strongly Agree    A Likert scale can be used along a seven or a five points scale. The middle point of this scale stands for a neutral attitude. Some modifications of this scale ask respondents to measure their attitudes along a four-point scale in order to elimination of the midpoint forces respondents to indicate their preference one way or the other. A Likert scale is used to measure attitudes help and help get at the emotional and preferential responses of customers.  For both the Likert and Thurstone scales, the reliability of the scales tends to increase with the number of items. However as the number of items in scale increases, so does the time taken to complete the attitude will increase, and this may demotivate the respondents. There is no hard and fast rule to determine the final number of items in a scale and this will reflect the nature and complexity of the attitude being assessed. 5 – Point Balanced / Unbalanced Scales: Scale such as Likert scale and semantic differential scales are non-comparative scales that are used in marketing research problems, particularly in attitude measurement. One of the major decisions that the researcher must make while using these scales is choice between the uses of a balanced or unbalanced scale. In a balanced scale, the numbers of favorable and unfavorable categories are equal in and number. I an unbalanced scale, they are unequal. 

For instance,

Balanced scale                                                      Unbalanced scale
Axe deo for men is:                                               Axe deo for men is:
Extremely Good___                                              Extremely Good_____
Very Good _____                                                  Very Good ______
Good _____                                                           Good______
Bad _______                                                         Somewhat Good________
Very Bad _______                                                Bad ________
Extremely Bad________                                      Very Bad_________
In general, a scale should be balanced in order to obtain data objectively. If the distribution of responses is likely to be skewed on either side, an unbalanced scale with more categories in the direction of Skewness can be more appropriate. If an unbalanced scale is used, the nature and extent of unbalance in the scale should be considered in data analysis.
 
MULTIDIMENSIONAL SCALING :Multidimensional scaling is a class of procedures for representing perceptions and preferences of respondents spatially by means of a visual display. Perceived relationships among stimuli are represented as geometric relationships among points in a multidimensional space. There geometric representations are known as spatial maps the axes which are assumed to denote the psychological bases or underlying dimensions respondents’ use to from perceptions and preferences for stimuli.
Multidimensional scaling (MDS) can be considered to be an alternative to factor analysis. The goal of the analysis is to detect meaningful underlying dimensions that allow the researcher to explain observed similarities or dissimilarities between the investigated objects under investigation. The factor analysis expresses the similarities between objects in the correlation matrix. MDS can analyze any kind of similarity or dissimilarity matrix in addition to correlation matrices. Thus, MDS provides a visual representation of the pattern of proximities (i.e. similarities or distances) among a set of objects.
MDS is used in marketing to identify: 
The number and nature of dimensions consumers use to perceive different brands in the marketplace.
The positioning of current brands on these dimensions.
The positioning of consumers’ ideal brand on these dimensions.
The information provided by MDS has been used for:
Image measurement: MDS can provide information about customer perceptions of the company’s image.
Market segmentation: The Company can position brands and consumers in the same two dimensional spaces, thus identifying appropriate segments.
New product development: Gaps in the perceptual space can indicate opportunities to position new products.
Assessing adverting effectiveness: MDS can be used to indicate if advertising has been successful in attaining the desired brand positioning or not.
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