Ch 5: Identifying Good Measurement

Question 1

categorical variable

Answer 1

a variable whose levels are categories (ex: male/female)

Question 2

concurrent validity

Answer 2

an empirically supported type of measurement validity that represents the extent to which a measure is related to a concrete, simultaneous outcome that it should be related to

Question 3

content validity

Answer 3

the extent to which a measure captures all parts of a defined construct

Question 4

convergent validity

Answer 4

an empirically supported type of measurement validity that represents the extent to which a measure associated with other measures of a theoretically similar construct

Question 5

correlation coefficient r

Answer 5

a single number, ranging from -1.0 to 1.0, used to indicate the strength and direction of an association

Question 6

Cronbach’s alpha/coefficient alpha

Answer 6

a correlation-based statistic that measures a scale’s internal reliability

Question 7

discriminant validity/divergent validity

Answer 7

an empirically supported type of measurement validity that represents the extent to which a measure does not associate strongly with measures of other, theoretically different constructs

Question 8

face validity

Answer 8

the extent to which a measure is subjectively considered a plausible operationalization of the conceptual variable in question

Question 9

internal reliability

Answer 9

in a measuring instrument that contains several items, the consistency in a pattern of answers, no matter how a question is phrased

Question 10

interrater reliability

Answer 10

the degree to which two or more coders or observers agree in their ratings of a set of targets

Question 11

interval scale

Answer 11

a quantitative measurement scale that has no ‘true zero” and in which the numerals represent equal intervals (distances) between levels (ex: temperature in degrees)

Question 12

observational measure/behavioral measure

Answer 12

a variable measured by recording observable behaviors or physical traces of behaviors

Question 13

ordinal scale

Answer 13

a quantitative measurement scale whose levels represent a ranked order, in which it is unclear whether the distances between levels are equivalent

Question 14

physiological measure

Answer 14

a variable measured by recording biological data

Question 15

predictive validity

Answer 15

an empirically supported type of measurement validity that represents the extent to which a measure is related to a concrete, future outcome that it should be related to

Question 16

quantitative variable

Answer 16

a variable whose values can be recorded as meaningful numbers

Question 17

ratio scale

Answer 17

a quantitative scale of measurements in which the numerals have equal intervals and the value of zero truly means “nothing” (ex: weight)

Question 18

reliability

Answer 18

the consistency of a measure

Question 19

self-report measure

Answer 19

a method of measuring a variable in which people answer questions about themselves in a questionnaire or interview

Question 20

slope direction

Answer 20

the upward, downward, or neutral slope of the cloud of points in a scatterplot

Question 21

strength

Answer 21

a description of an association indicating how closely the data points in a scatterplot cluster along a line of best fit drawn through them

Question 22

test-retest reliability

Answer 22

the consistency in results every time a measure is used