The attitude scales make certain basic assumptions:
- That attitudes can be expressed by verbal statements
- That statements have the same meaning for all participants
- That attitudes when expressed as verbal statements can be measured and quantified.
Thurston scale (1931)
A list of statements representing a wide range of views in relation to a specific attitude object is prepared. These are then given to a group of judges who rate the statements on an 11-point scale, from positive to negative. Any statements which produce considerable disagreement are thrown out until 20 statements are left. Each statement is then allocated a rating value. A self report questionnaire is then filled out be participants who state which of the statements they agree with. A mean attitude score is calculated from the value of the selected statements.
Likert scale (1932)
This scale is most commonly used. It comprises of a balanced number of statements with regards to a specific attitude object. The participant is then asked how they rate each statement, usually on a 5-point scale: 1 strongly agrees to 5 strongly disagree. The subject’s attitude is measured by totalling the scores for each statement, usually showing a correlation. These scales have an advantage because they do not expect a basic yes/no answer as they allow for degrees of opinion.
Semantic differential scales Osgood, Suci and Tannenbaum (1957)
Participants are usually asked to rate on a 7-point scale between two opposite words, e.g. good and bad, which describe their feeling towards a particular attitude object.
The questionnaires would have at least two of these scales constructed around the three main factors associated with the meaning of words or attitude objects. For example:
- Evaluative factor (good/bad)
- Potency factor (strong/weak)
- Activity factor (9active/passive)
There are some problems associated with attitude measurement these are;
- Inappropriate/ambiguous questions
- Response bias
- People trying to present socially acceptable viewpoints
- People attempting to deliberately distort the results
- People tending to always to answer yes or no or preferring certain points on the scale (people tend to agree rather than disagree)
- The way in which the questions are asked can also influence the answer.
