For each of the following variables, identify the level of measurement. For each

Question

For each of the following variables, identify the level of measurement. For each pair, choose the appropriate measure of association (Pearson’s r, gamma, lambda) for the relationship:

1. IV = Military Service (Army, Navy, Air Force); DV = Ideology (Liberal, Moderate, Conservative)

2. IV = Convention Viewing (number of speeches watched); DV = Support for Political Party (100-point feeling thermometer)

3. IV = Freedom (Least Free, Some Free, Most Free); DV = Economy (Pre-emerging, Emerging, Advanced)

Explanation / Answer

1. Ordinal

2. Nominal

3. Ordinal

In nominal measurement the numerical values just "name" the attribute uniquely. No ordering of the cases is implied. For example, jersey numbers in basketball are measures at the nominal level. A player with number 30 is not more of anything than a player with number 15, and is certainly not twice whatever number 15 is.

In ordinal measurement the attributes can be rank-ordered. Here, distances between attributes do not have any meaning. For example, on a survey you might code Educational Attainment as 0=less than high school; 1=some high school.; 2=high school degree; 3=some college; 4=college degree; 5=post college. In this measure, higher numbers mean more education. But is distance from 0 to 1 same as 3 to 4? Of course not. The interval between values is not interpretable in an ordinal measure.

In interval measurement the distance between attributes doeshave meaning. For example, when we measure temperature (in Fahrenheit), the distance from 30-40 is same as distance from 70-80. The interval between values is interpretable. Because of this, it makes sense to compute an average of an interval variable, where it doesn't make sense to do so for ordinal scales. But note that in interval measurement ratios don't make any sense - 80 degrees is not twice as hot as 40 degree

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