Operational Definition

What is Measurement?

 For any rigorous, scientific investigation of phenomena

(people, objects, events, attitudes, or behaviors)
measurement is a central concern.
Measurement entails developing rulesand methods that
guide researchers when they assign of numbers or labels
to the phenomena under investigation. There is a wide
variety of objects or things that researchers measure.

problem for social scientists is that the phenomena we

seek to measure are generally too abstract to be classified
has either objects or things.
What is Measurement?

measurement is the process of linking abstract

concepts or constructs to empirical indicants.
[1] It is a process involving both theoretical
considerations about the concept under investigation
and empirical observation or attitudes, behaviors, and
events.
Some things are relatively easy to measure because the
rules used to create the measurement are simple.
Age, is easily measured.
> birth date and the calendar
How about gender?
Some researchers use a two-step protocol when asking
questions of gender identity:[3]
Step 1:
What is your current gender identity?
O Male
O Female
O Trans male/Trans man
O Trans female/Trans woman
O Genderqueer/Gender non-conforming
O Different identity (please state): ____________________________
Step 2:
What gender were you assigned on your original birth certificate?
O Male
O Female
Many concepts of interest to researchers—brand
loyalty, household income, purchase intent, voter
intent—are difficult to measure because it is no easy to
establish rules to measure the true value of these
attributes.
Concepts and Constructs
Concepts are based on our experiences. Concepts can be
based on real phenomena and are a generalized idea of
something of meaning. Examples of concepts include
common demographic measures: Income, Age, Eduction
Level, Number of SIblings.

We can measure concepts through direct and indirect

observations:
Direct Observation: We can measure someone's weight or
height. And, we can record the color of their hair or eyes.
Indirect Observation: We can use a questionnaire in
which respondents provide answers to our questions about
gender, income, age, attitudes, and behaviors.
Constructs
Constructs exist at a higher level of abstraction
than concepts.
Constructs are considered latent variable because they
cannot be directly observed or measured.
Constructs
Broad concepts or topics of study
Abstract
Not directly observable
May be complex (have multiple parts)
Examples of constructs: 
Aggression
Love
Intelligence
 Life satisfaction
For example, self-esteem is a measure of how people
feel about themselves.

Three aspects of self-esteem that can be measured are:

a)levels of confidence in success
b) level of belief that the person is good enough
c) willingness to ask questions

The values that levels of confidence might take on are:

no confidence, low confidence, neither confident nor
not confident, high confidence, very high confidence.