A Scale for Assessing SocioEconomic Status in

Survey Research
This article contains the description of a socio-economic scale based on the answers
to five simple questions. The scale has been found useful in urban and rural areas
and is particularly adapted to survey research.
Charles L. Vaughn is in the Marketing and Social Research Division of the Psychological Corporation.
COMMON METHOD USED in assessing socio-economic status of respondent
homes in survey research is to obtain interviewer ratings of the variable.
These ratings are generally based upon a quick inspection of the dwelling
unit in which the person is conducting the interview and upon the personal
care and speech of the respondent The interviewer may or may not have
advance knowledge of the general characteristics of the area in which he or
she is working. If the interviewer is approaching people on the street, the
personal care and speech of the respondents are almost the sole guides he or
she has for making the ratings.
Although some of the largest differences in survey results are revealed in
the analyses by socio-economic groups, ratings suffer a number of limitations,
of which the following would appear to be the principal ones: 1

(1) They are not very reliable:2

(2) They require considerable interviewer instructionwhich may considerably reduce the instruction that can be given on the aspects of
the questionnaire more directly pertinent to the research problem at
hand.
(3) The ratings may fail to differentiate between households. In the
usual situation, interviewers rate the large majority of homes in the
middle group. This "error of central tendency" is common to a great
many types of ratings. In the survey situation, of course, the tendency
may be reduced or eliminated by assigning quotas by socio-economic
group)although other errors may be introduced by this procedure.
1
For a detailed review of the subject of social class see W. Lloyd Warner, Marcia Meeker,
and Kenneth Eelj, Social Class in America. Chicago: Science Research Associates, 1949. xiil +
274 pp.
3
Vaughn, Charles L. and William A. Reynold*. "Reliability of Personal Interview Data."
Journal of Applied Psychology, 35, 1951, pp. 61-63.

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B Y CHARLES L . VAUGHN

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REQUIREMENTS OF A SCALE FOR USE IN SURVEY RESEARCH

In the course of developmental work on the present project, the following

requirements of a worthwhile scale became apparent:
(1) The scale must be reliable and valid. Because in most continuing research, trend lines have already been established by socio-economic
group, the term validity as applied to a new scale means that it must
measure essentially the same set of characteristics that had been measured previously by the rating methods used. To be reliable the scale
must be relatively free from errors in questioning, response, recording, and processing.
(2) The scale must differentiate not only between the very high and very
low groups, but also between homes near the middle of the distribution of socio-economic status.
(3) The scale must be simple to use in the field. It must require relatively
few instructions, require no large block of space on the questionnaire,
and require no more than a small amount of time to administer. It
must be acceptable to respondents, covering topics on which they
could and would report
(4) The scale must yield results that are readily processed; it must not require a great deal of coding or editing, nor more than a column or
two on an IBM card.
(5) For reasons of economy, an acceptable scale must not require frequent revision.
Other methods than those used to derive the scale described herein might,
of course, accomplish the same objectives. For example, it might have been
possible to use respondents' reports of the income of the various members
8
Development of the scale was stimulated by Dr. John McNamara, Food Manufacturer!,
Inc. (then M and M. Ltd.). Staff members of the Marketing and Social Research Divijion of
The Psychological Corporation, particularly Mr. P. G. Corby and Dr. A. D. Freiberg, cooperated in the developmental and validational work.

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There are also some advantages in ratings, viz: they are simple to process
and are quickly made in the field, if interviewer procedure is not carefully
controlled. They also must have some validity, as evidenced by the large differences that are customarily revealed by analyses in terms of the ratings.
The initial stimulus for the development of the present scale was the need
for a device that would provide reliable and valid socio-economic groupings
of people interviewed on the street in small pilot research studies.8
Conclusion of this project was prompted by a shift from assigning interviewer quotas by socio-economic group to the making of interviewer assignments in terms of small pre-selectcd areas, or "clusters," and by specific routes
within those clusters. In this latter type of assignment, interviewer ratings
tended to become non-discriminative.

SCALE FOR ASSESSING SOCIO-ECONOMIC STATUS

21

RESEARCH PLAN

Seven questions were included in a national personal interview survey of

7,500 homes in urban territory and rural villages. The survey was conducted
in January and February, 1951. Each answer to five of these seven questions
was then scaled against interviewers' ratings of socio-economic status. The
scaling was done in such a way that the scale values, or scores, assigned each
answer would reflect the deviation of the answer from the mean of the distribution of socio-economic status. All scale values were expressed in terms of
the standard deviation of the distribution of households by socio-economic
status. Since all answers were expressed as deviations from the mean in terms
of equivalent units, the scale values assigned the respective answers were
then additive. Once the scale values had been determined, they were converted to code numbers appropriate for IBM processing. The questioning
and recording were condensed for field use; and scale results from subsequent studies were cross-validated against interviewer ratings.
The Questions.
(1) Are you or is somebody else the chief wage earner in your home?
(2) (About chief wage earner) What is (your, his, her) occupation?
(Record occupation of chief wave earner in detail by type of work
and position)
(3) {About chief wage earner) About how far did (you, he, she) go in
school? 8th grade or less; 1-2 years high school; completed high
school; some college; completed college.
(4) Is there a car in your home ? (If Yes) How many ? (If one car only)
Was it bought new or used ?
(5) Is there a telephone in your home ? (If Yes) Party or private line ?
(6) Do you rent or own the place where you are living?
(7a) How many bedrooms are there in your home ?
(7b) How many people live there?
These particular questions were included in the study because it was
judged on an a priori basis that they would differentiate homes on a socioeconomic basis. Question 1 was included to "set up" Questions 2 and 3. It

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of the household. These reports, however, were not substituted for ratings
because "household income" reflects less of the "social aspect of socio-economic
status" than desired. There arc also other objections to use of household income, viz: questioning on the subject tends to irritate respondents and thus
to demoralize interviewers. Family income also fluctuates widely and relatively few persons in the household can report reliably on the subject. Another
solution that was considered was to spread interviewer ratings over twelve
rather than four groups, but this procedure still resulted in poor discrimination.

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PUBLIC OPINION QUARTERLY

DERIVATION OF THE SCALE

The Criterion. The criteria against which the answers to the questions
were scaled, were interviewers' ratings of the socio-economic status of the
households in which respondents resided. These ratings were along a threepoint scale, upper, middle, and lower socio-economic group. Assignments in
a given town or city were made in such a way that 30 per cent of the ratings
were "upper"; 40 per cent "middle"; and 30 per cent "lower". The raters
were thus forced to discriminate.

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was believed that Questions 2 and 3 would differentiate along the entire
range; Questions 4 and 5, at the bottom end of the scale; etc
One might assume that Questions 2 and 3 would be sufficient, and this assumption is correct, except for the fact that more than two questions were
necessary to provide relatively fine discriminations. The questions on number of bedrooms and number of people in the home (Q's 7a and 7b) were
included to obtain an index of crowding, but the questions met with so
much respondent resistance that they were later dropped. The index of
crowding also posed difficulties in processing and was not very discriminating.
The Sample. The national sample in which the questions were originally
included represented all urban and small town (rural non-farm) households
in the United States. Interviews were made in 123 localities, i.e. standard
metropolitan areas or non-metropolitan counties, and in 273 cities, towns, and
villages within those areas.
Within cities, towns, and villages, interviewers were assigned to spots on
the basis of socio-economic maps of the places, prepared by field supervisors,
or Research Associates of The Psychological Corporation. These maps showed
the respective parts of the locality where the upper, middle, and lower socioeconomic groups resided. Because of variations in socio-economic status, even
within small areas in a city, interviewers were assigned a specific quota of
interviewsi.e. a certain number of interviews with persons in the upper
group, in the middle group, and in the bottom group. The interviewer had
to use judgment in selecting households within these three groups, and rated
the homes as he interviewed.
Only one person was interviewed per household. The individuals interviewed in the households were chosen to match the distribution of individuals aged eight years and older in the United States population as shown by
the Census of 1950. If a person was not at home in a household, a substitute
was taken, either in that household or in the next household. So that persons
who are frequently away from home would be given some weight in the
sample, a small percentage of interviews were made in shopping districts near
the areas assigned. The interviewing was supervised locally by 120 psychologists serving as Research Associates of The Psychological Corporation.

SCALE FOR ASSESSING SOCIO-ECONOMIC STATUS

23

PROPRIETORS, MANAGERS, AND OFFICIALS

Fraction in Lower Socio-Economic Group

Fraction in Middle Socio-Economic Group
Fraction in Upper Socio-Economic Group
Total

092
341
567
1.000

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The use of interviewer ratings as the criterion may, of course, raise some
questions. However, these ratings, based in part upon socio-economic maps
of the respective interviewing localities, were the basis of breakdowns used
in previous studies, and differences in answers between broad socio-economic
groups were generally quite significant. One aim of the present research was
to develop a scale that would discriminate on much the same basis as the
interviewer ratings had prior to the change in sampling methods, so that
trend comparisons would not be jeopardized by artifacts.
Also, it seemed probable that the persons best able to distinguish between
broad groups locally were the interviewers who called upon the homes and
talked to the people therein even though differentiation in the middle ranges
might not be a fine one. At least the intelligent field interviewer, supervised
by a local resident at the professional level and assisted by a socio-economic
map, would appear to be a better judge of the status of homes than would
someone basing this decision upon an a priori and theoretical conception of
what constitutes social status.
As a basis for scaling the answers to the five questions and parts thereof,
the assumption was made that socio-economic status is normally distributed.
This assumption can not be grossly in error. All it means is that some households have a very high status and others a very low status, but most fall in
a large middle group, those above average being distributed along a bellshaped curve in about the same fashion as those below average. Certainly the
normal curve approximates the underlying distribution of socio-economic
status, and the ready availability of tables of areas under the normal curve
facilitates scaling and statistical analysis.
Scaling Against Criterion.The detailed scaling procedure will be illustrated below for the occupation of the "Chief Wage Earner". The other
answers were similarly scaled.
Respondents' reports of occupation were classified into the standard Census categories: "Proprietors, managers, and officials except farm;" "professional workers, semi-professional workers;" "salesmen"; etc These were then
cross analyzed by socio-economic rating. To illustrate, details of the
procedure for "proprietors, managers, and officials except farm" will be
shown,

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PUBLIC OPINION QUARTERLY

Equation 1.
Equation 2:

_c (X - Mv)
a,
(O

(X - M,)
a,

M^
<T,

a. (Z - M, , (Z - M,)
Mv
.
...
E
*- +
= -*- , in which

<rp = standard deviation of distribution of proprietors, managers, etc.

in terms of that distribution
<r, = standard deviation of the total distribution on socio-economic
status = 1.
M, = mean of the distribution of proprietors etc. as a deviation from
fl^i ( = 0 ) , the mean of the total distribution.
X = distance from the mean {.34", or m,} of the dividing point between
the middle and lower groups.
Z = distance from the mean {Mt or mr\ of the dividing point between
the upper and the middle groups.
Solving the simultaneous Equations "1" and "2" for ^ results in the
following:
(Z - M.)
( X - Mt)
Equation 3:

a*

a,

at
-

Wt,)

(X-

Values on the right side of Equation 3 may be obtained by reference to

standard tables of areas and o--distances for the normal probability curve.
The value for - e thus obtained may be substituted in Equation 1 to obtain
- ^ which may be checked by substitution in Equation 2.

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It was assumed that some of this occupational group would have a relatively high socio-economic status, some a relatively low one, but that the
group would tend to "peak" at a mid-point along the socio-economic continuum.
Knowing the fractions of proprietors, managers, etc who fell in the upper,
middle, and lower group respectively, one may compute the distance of the
mean of this group (Mp) from the mean of the distribution (Mt). This distance may, in turn be converted into standard deviation units of the larger
distribution (<*t = 1)> by solving these simultaneous equations:

SCALE FOR ASSESSING SOCIO-ECONOMIC STATUS

25

EXAMPLE:
Fraction of "proprietors, managers,
officials, etc." in:

Obtained by reference
to tables:

Lower socio-economic group = .092,

Upper socio-economic group = .567,

^ = .17

Substituting these values in Equation 3 gives the following:

j
a,

. 5 2 + .52 _ 1.04 _
- . 1 7 + 1.33
1.16

Substituting -* from Equation 1 gives;

-.90(-1.33) + (-.52) = ^

= .68,

the scale value of "proprietors, managers, officials, etc." stated as a

deviation from the mean of the total distribution in terms of the standard
deviation of that distribution. (o- = 1)
Other items were scaled similarly.
In this type of scaling it is important that the signs of the various components be correctly recorded. Signs change as the mean of the sub-group
changes from one side to the other of the cutting points. The method becomes
more complicated as the standard deviation of the subgroup becomes smaller.
It would, of course, be possible as a final check to scale every answer against
every other answer.
SCALED SCORES AND FIELD SCORES OF ANSWERS FROM THE FIVE ITEMS

Table 1 shows the scaled, or sigma( o), scores of the five items togedier
with the field scores. The field scores, which are integers corresponding to
the scaled scores, are recorded by the interviewers. They add these scores for
the five items to obtain the total socio-economic scaled score.

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Middle socio-economic group = .341

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PUBLIC OPINION QUARTERLY

1
m

_2_
3

_
The total socio-economic scaled score for the household is 13.
Thirteen is the maximum score that a household can make. The lowest
score would be made by a household with: no telephone (score = 0);
renters occupying it (score = 1); no car (score = 1); the chief wage earner
a laborer (score = 0 ) ; and with the chief wage earner a person who left
school after finishing grammar school (score = 0). The total score for this
household at the lowest level would be two. This range in scores from 2 to 13
facilitates IBM processing. All scores except 13 are punched as they are. Scores
of "13" are converted to "l's" during the inspection process.
In actual practice, the five basic questions are printed on one side of a
5 " x 8" card with the field scores corresponding to the response alternatives
thereon. Only the response record for numbers appears on the questionnaire
blank. Since the office coding of occupation is time consuming and tedious,
illustrative occupations and scores therefore are printed on the second side
of the card containing the questions, so that the interviewer records merely
the number corresponding to the occupational level.
DISTRIBUTION OF SCALED SCORES

Illustration 1 and Table 2 show the distributions of total scaled scores

from two studies:
Study #1. This study was based upon 8,000 interviews, a cross-section of
all households in urban territory and rural villages in the United States.

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In assigning field scores to the respective answers, we have grouped together the answers that were no more than 05* apart in terms of the scaled
scores. This procedure simplifies scoring in the field and IBM processing in
the office. Since in actual practice there will always be some "don't know" or
"no answer" responses we have scaled these alternatives along with the others
as shown in Table 1.
An example of how the score is obtained in the field may be helpful.
Suppose the respondent reports that: (k) the home has a private line telephone; (1) the family owns the home; (m) there are two or more cars in
the household; (n) the chief wage earner is a drug store owner; and (o) the
chief wage earner graduated from college. The interviewer records the scores
as follows:
k
_2_

u.

10

Ul

SAMPl

PER CEf

IS

1,617 Rurol Village Interviewe,

Above Study

Study

1 ,
9

10

II

12

13

14

a - 2.8

Normal Curve with Mean of 7.3 and

10,000 Urban Interviews,

February 1955 Barometer

SCALED SOCIO-ECONOMIC SCORE

- 8 , 0 0 0 Urban and Rural Village Interviews,

Winter Beverage Biography, 1955,
Mean 7.3, <T 2.8

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onb

zo

J8

No phone

.00 to +.49

- . 5 0 to - . 9 9

Telephone
Ownership

Private line
Don't know
no ans.
Party line

.00 to +.49

+.50 to +.99

Scaled
Scores

Rent home,
no ans.

Own home

Home
Ownership

Professional
& semi-prof,
workers;
proprietors,
managers, eta
Salesmen;
clerical workers
Craftsmen,
formen, misc.;
retired, unemployed; don't
know; no answer;
protective workers,
operatives
Other svce.
workers; domestic
service wkrs.
laborers.

One car bought

used; no car;
don't know;
no ans.

Occupation
(Hd. Hsehld.)

Two or more
cars or one
car bought new

Car
Ownership

SCALED SCORES AND FIELD SCORES OF VARIOUS

ANSWERS FROM THE FIVE ITEMS

TABLE 1

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8th grade or less.

1-3 years HS,

Don't know
no answer

Some college;
Completed HS

Completed
College

Education
(Hd. Hsehld.)

Field
Scores

>

SCALE FOR ASSESSING SOCKIECONOMIC STATUS

29

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Interviews were made in 99 localities (Standard Metropolitan Areas and nonmetropolitan counties) and in 259 urban places and rural villages within
those localities.
All counties in the United States were stratified with respect to metropolitan vs. non-metropolitan counties, geographic area, population, per family
income, per cent engaged in agriculture, and per cent white in the South.
Interviewers were assigned to work in small areas or clustersusually a
city block or the equivalent thereofand were given definite routes to follow
in the respective "clusters". There were 400 clusters in ah1.
Only one interview was made per household. Approximately one-third of
the adults and somewhat more than a half of respondents 10-20 years of age
were interviewed in the shopping district or playground nearest the cluster.
Besides the distribution of scaled scores for all households, Illustration I
also shows the distributions for the subsamples of urban and rural village
households, respectively.
The sample of 8,000 households is essentially the same as that upon which
the various items were scaled, the only difference being that all localities,
urban places, rural villages and clusters in the present sample were randomly
selected within the respective strata. Such was not the case in the sample
used as the base for scaling.
Study # 2 . This study was based upon interviews in 10,000 households,
representing all urban households in the United States. Selection of localities,
interviewing spots, etc. was made in a similar fashion to that in Study #1,
except that there were 1,000 such spots, or clusters, rather than 400, and
interviewing was conducted in 364 urban places and fringe areas in 91
localities.
All interviews in the Barometer were made with the "man of the house"
or the "woman of the house"one interview per householdand all interviews were made in the home.
Illustration I also shows a normal curve with mean and standard deviation the same as those for the distribution of socio-economic scores from the
8,000 household sample of Study # 1 .
Discussion. The scale discriminates. The urban samples yield about the
same distributions. The distribution of scores for the sample of households
in rural villages was somewhat lower than that for the urban samples, but
not greatly so.
The distributions approximate the normal curve shown in Illustration I.
However, there is some skewness: relatively more low scores were obtained
in Study # 1 than would be expected if the distribution were normal. This
situation is most likely due to the fact that interviewing spots in this 1955
study were chosen by the use of tables of random numbers; interviewing spots
in the 1951, or original "scaling," study were chosen on a judgmental basis;

PUBLIC OPINION QUARTERLY

and judgment samples are customarily somewhat higher on the socioeconomic ladder than are samples from which interviewer judgment has been
largely removed. The small divergence of the distributions from normal,
however, does not seriously limit the usefulness of the scale.
TABLE 2

Socio-economic
Score

Per Cent of Households Achieving

Each Score

Suggested Letter
Grade Equivalent
and Description

Study fl
Study f2
Urban & Rural Village Urban Only
13
A Top
(15%)
3.6
2.7
12
5.1
4.6
11
6.5
6.7
10
8.4
9.1
9
B Upper (31%)
10.0
10.5
8
11.6
11.6
Middle
7
12.9
12.6
6
13.3
12.5
C Lower (36%)
5
11.2
10.8
Middle
4
8.6
8.8
3
6.1
D Bottom (18%)
6.0
2
2.9
3.9
100.0
100.0
(100%)
Total
Numbers in parentheses are approximate per cents achieving each suggested letter
grade.
RELIABILITY AND VALIDITY OF THE SCALE

Validity of the scale is to some extent assured by the manner in which it

was constructed. However, a cross-validational study resulted in a Pearsonian
correlation coefficient of .61 between interviewer ratings of socio-economic
status and total scaled scores.
The cross-validational group comprised 1828 households representing all
households in the New York, Philadelphia, and Boston Standard Metropolitan Areas. Interviews were made in some 183 neighborhoods in the three
areas, the selection of neighborhoods being made by area sampling methods.
The correlation of .61 between ratings and scaled scores is as high as the
correlation obtained between ratings themselves when different interviewers
were used to rate the same households.*
On the other hand, in one study made in 1956 the Pearsonian coefficient
of correlation between original and repeat scaled scores from the same homes
was 5. This correlation was obtained with a group of 317 homes distributed
over the United States. Interviews were originally made in the homes as a
* Vaughn and Reynolds, op. cit.

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DISTRIBUTIONS OF SCALED SOOO-ECONOMIC SCORES

FROM Two NATIONAL SURVEYS

SCALE FOR ASSESSING SOCIO-ECONOMIC STATUS

31

NOTE OK USE OF THE SCALE IN FARM HOMES

Subsequent to preparation of the foregoing article the scale has been applied to a sample of 447 farm homes. This sample was a cross-section of all
farm homes in the United States and was obtained as a supplement to the
May 1957 Psychological Barometer.
No particular problems were encountered in using the scale this first time
in farm homes, and it does discriminate between homes in this group, as
shown by Table 3. On the surface, at least, the scale would appear to be as
valid with farm as with urban and rural non-farm homes.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

This report describes a scale originally designed for assessing the socioeconomic status of homes in urban territory and rural villages in the United
States. Data obtained subsequent to construction of the scale would indicate
that it is also useful with farm homes.
The scale value assigned to a home depends upon the answers of anyone
from that home to five basic questions and parts thereof. The questions pertain to: telephone "ownership"; home ownership; automobile ownership;
occupation of chief wage earner in the home; and his (or her) education.
The numerical value assigned to each answer has been determined by
scaling the respective answers against interviewers' ratings of homes in urban
territory and rural villages in the United States. These ratings were based in

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part of the May, 1956, Psychological Barometer; reintcrviews were made in

the same homes in July, 1956, generally by different interviewers. (The homes
were those in which a tire had been purchased during the previous year.)
Certain relationships between scaled scores and other variables also indicate
a high degree of reliability and validity of the scale. For example, studies indicate that the following variables are closely related in the expected direction
to scaled scores: median family income, when geographic division is held
constant; percentage of homes with television sets; and percentage of Negro
homes. In fact the curves depicting the relationships arc exceptionally smooth
for social data.
Certain brands of products known to have positive prestige value show an
increasing incidence of use in groups with higher scale scores; and conversely, brands purchased for other reasons show greater frequency of use in
groups with lower scores. Here again the curves showing the relationships
are unusually smooth for those derived from social data.
Aside from questions in the product field, answers to questions in the
social and political areas also show the expected relationships to scaled scores,
in particular, the percentage of persons who answer "don't know" to questions in these areas.

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TABLE 3
DISTRIBUTION OF SCALED SOOO-ECONOMIC SCORES
FROM SURVEY OF FARM HOMES

(Special Sample of 447 Farm Homes, May, 1957 Psychological Barometer)

Percent of Household}

Achieving Bach
Score

13
12
11
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2

.8
1.8
8.9
8.3

Total

16.1
9.4

14.3
13.6
S.I

10.3
6.7
4.7

100.0

part upon socio-economic maps of places where interviewers operated. The

method of scaling is described in some detail in this report. Scale values of
the respective items vary from "0" to "3"they are essentially standard
scores.
The sum of the scores on the respective items is the total scaled score
for the home. The total scaled scores vary from "2" to "13," inclusive. They
are approximately normally distributed, witii a mean of about "7" and a
standard deviation of about "3."
The scale thus discriminates between homes. The scale appears to be
reliable and valid. Scale values correlate about .60 with interviewer ratings.
In several studies, close and consistent relationships were shown between
other variables and scaled scores. Certain of these other variables are those
that one would judge should be related to socio-economic status.
The scale as developed for field use requires very little space on the questionnaire. Children as well as adults can report the necessary facts. The questions require no more than a few minutes of interviewer-respondent time,
and can be asked in street as well as home interviews. The total socioeconomic score is pre-coded (by the interviewer so to speak), and can be
punched in one column of an IBM card.
Norms appear to be relatively stable. Over a period of time, however,
scores for certain of the items may decrease in discriminative value, and the
distributions will require periodic scrutiny, although changes will probably
not be rapid.

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Socio-Economic
Scare

SCALE FOR ASSESSING SOCiqECONOMIC STATUS

33

The fact that the scale distinguishes twelve-points along a continuum

makes it possible to study and highlight certain relationships not clearly
visible with a four-point scale ("A," "B," "C," and "D"). On the other hand,
the scaled scores may be grouped into categories, e.g.:

With the relatively fine discrimination afforded by the scale, other groupings
may be used. Those above appear to be convenient, and the breaking points
loosely correspond with significant parameters of the normal curve, i.e. the
two inflection points and the mean or mode.
Use of all twelve points on the scale, however, makes it relatively simple
to derive mathematical expressions of various relationshipssuch as those
between television set ownership, incidence of Negroes, use of certain brands
of products, knowledge about various companies, etc. and socio-economic
level. Whether or not the mathematical expression of these relationships
would have any practical value is open to question, although the application
of operational research techniques to problems in marketing, public relation,
and communication might be facilitated thereby.
It would also be a comparatively simple matter to ascertain with a fairly
high degree of precision the specific channels of communication that can most
effectively and efficiently be used to reach homes in which the members are
relatively ignorant on a given topic, those who do not use a given brand of
product, etc.without relying too heavily on judgment and without repeating a media study for every brand of product and on every public relations topic.
The scale can also be used as a basis for comparing one community with
others across the nation in terms of: (a) its average cultural position and
(b) its variability in cultural status. This topic assumes significance in one
way when the attempt is made to apply a company-wide, or national, community relations program to a particular community. If the community is
definitely more homogeneous than the cross-section of communities and is
below average culturally, the media and specific appeals required there may
be quite different from those generally applicable. On the other hand, the
uniqueness of a community may be more apparent than real. The use of
objective measuring instruments is necessary to obtain a valid picture of
what the situation actually is.

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'Top," with a letter grade equivalent of "A," and comprising the

highest 15 per cent of households
"Upper Middle," grade equivalent "B," comprising the next 31 per
cent of households;
"Lower Middle," grade equivalent "C," comprising the next 36 per
cent of households; and
"Bottom," grade equivalent "D," comprising the lowest 18 per cent
of households.

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PUBLIC OPINION QUARTERLY

The reader will undoubtedly see many research problems associated with
the use of a scale of t-his nature. A topic, which we are now investigating,
is the variability in cultural level within neighborhoods vs. that between
neighborhoods. Of potentially the greatest interest, however, is probably the
subject of what specific communication channels and appeals can be used the
most efficiently to reach homes at the various cultural levels.
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