Applications to Social Work Research Levels of Measurement Applications to Social Work Research

Levels of Measurement Refers to the precision of data collected for a research study Has implications for types of statistical procedure that can be done Important foundation knowledge for statistics

Four Levels of Measurement Nominal Ordinal Interval Ratio

Nominal Classifies elements into two or more mutually exclusive categories Categories should exhaustive (include all possibilities) Examples of nominal variables include sex, race, and

Nominal Level Example 1 Sex is a nominal level variable A person can be either female or male Male female

Nominal Level Example 2 A person could be either European American, Asian American, or African American European American Asian American African American

Ordinal Level Data Classifies and ranks elements or scores Definite order to categories Examples include socio-economic status and difficulty of care

Ordinal Level Data Example 1 Categories of socio-economic status (SES) can be low-income, middle income, and high income.