Marketing Research

Marketing Research Aaker, Kumar, Day Seventh Edition Instructor’s Presentation Slides

Chapter Eleven Attitude Measurement

Attitude Measurement • Majority of questions in marketing research are designed to measure attitudes • Attitudes include • Information possessed • Feelings of like and/or dislike • Intentions to behave • Management wants to understand and influence behavior Aaker, Kumar, Day

Reasons for Measuring Attitudes • Attitudes lead to behavior • More feasible to ask questions on attitudes than to observe and interpret behavior • Large capacity for diagnosis and explanation • Learn which features of a new product concept are acceptable or unacceptable • Measure the perceived strengths and weaknesses of competitive alternatives Aaker, Kumar, Day

What Are Attitudes? • Mental states used by individuals to structure the way they perceive their environment and guide the way they respond to it Aaker, Kumar, Day

Components of Attitude Cognitive or Knowledge Component • Represents a person’s information about an object • Awareness of existence on the object • Beliefs about the characteristics or attributes of the object • Judgments about the relative importance of each of the attributes Aaker, Kumar, Day

Components of Attitude (Cont.) Affective or Liking Component • Summarizes a person’s overall feelings toward an object, situation, or person • On a scale of like-dislike or favorable-unfavorable • When there are several alternatives, liking is expressed in terms of preference • Measured by asking which alternative is “most preferred” or “first choice,” which is the “second choice,” and so on Aaker, Kumar, Day

Components of Attitude (Cont.) Intention or Action Component • Refers to a person’s expectations of future behavior toward an object • Intentions are usually limited to a distinct time period that depends on buying habits and planning horizons Advantage • Incorporates information about a respondent’s ability or willingness to pay for the object, or other taken action Aaker, Kumar, Day

Measurement and Scaling Measurement • Standardized process of assigning numbers or other symbols to certain characteristics of objects of interests according to pre-specified rules Characteristics for Standardization • One-to-one correspondence between the symbol and the characteristic in the object that is being measured • Rules for assignment should be invariant over time and the objects being measured Aaker, Kumar, Day

Measurement and Scaling (Contd.) Scaling • Process of creating a continuum on which objects are located according to the amount of the measured characteristic that the object possesses Aaker, Kumar, Day

Measurement Scales Nominal Scale • Objects are assigned to mutually exclusive, labeled categories • No necessary relationships among categories • No ordering or spacing are implied • Only possible arithmetic operation is a count of each category Aaker, Kumar, Day

Measurement Scales (Contd.) Ordinal Scale • Rank objects or arrange them in order by some common variable • Does each object have more or less of a variable than some other object? • Does not provide information on how much difference between objects • Arithmetic operations are limited to statistics such as median or mode Aaker, Kumar, Day

Measurement Scales (Contd.) Interval Scale • Numbers are assigned to objects that represent categories, rank orders, as well as how much the object is preferred on the attribute being measured • Differences can be compared • Entire range of statistical operations can be employed Aaker, Kumar, Day

Measurement Scales (Contd.) Ratio Scale • Type of interval scale with meaningful zero point • Possible to say how many times greater or smaller one object is than another • Magnitude scaling of attitudes has been calibrated through numeric estimation Aaker, Kumar, Day

Attitude Rating Scales • Present a respondent with a continuum of numbered categories that represent the range of possible attitude adjustments • Single item or multiple item scales Aaker, Kumar, Day

Classification of Attitude Scales Attitude Scales Multi-Item Scales Single-Item Scales Continuous Scales Itemized Category Scales Comparative Scales Semantic Differential Scale Associative Scales Q-sort Scales Paired Comparison Scales Rank Order Scales Constant Sum Scales Pictorial Scales Likert Scales Thurstone Scales Stapel Scales Aaker, Kumar, Day

Single Item Scales • Only have one item to measure a construct • Itemized-category scale most widely used by marketing researchers • Other single item scales • Comparative • Rank-order • Q-sort • Pictorial • Constant sum Aaker, Kumar, Day

Single Item Scales (Contd.) Itemized-category Scales • Scales in which the respondent selects from a limited number of categories Comparative Scale • A judgment comparing one object, concept, or person against one another Aaker, Kumar, Day

Single Item Scales (Contd.) Rank-order Scales • Scale in which the respondent compares one item with another or a group of items against each other and ranks them Q-sort Scaling • Respondents sort comparative characteristics into normally distributed groups • Ten or more groups increases accuracy of results Aaker, Kumar, Day

Single Item Scales (Contd.) Constant-sum scale • Respondents allocate a fixed number of rating points among serial objects to reflect relative preference Pictorial scales • Various categories of the scale are depicted pictorially • Thermometer Scale • Funny faces scale • Format must be comprehensible to respond and allow accurate response Aaker, Kumar, Day

Single Item Scales (Contd.) Paired-Comparison Scales • The brands to be rated are presented two at a time, so each brand in the category was compared once to every other brand • Brands are rated on a given 10 pts. that are then divided between the two brands Advantages • Performs well on the criteria Limitations • Cumbersome to administer • Frame of reference is always the other brand being tested; these brands may change over time Aaker, Kumar, Day

Designing Single Item Scales • Number of Scale Categories • Types of Poles Used in the Scale • Strength of the Anchors • Labeling of the Categories • Balance of a Scale Aaker, Kumar, Day

Multiple-item Scales • Developed to measure a sample of beliefs toward the attitude objects and combine the set of answers into an average score Aaker, Kumar, Day

Multiple-item Scales (Contd.) Likert Scale • Requires respondent to indicate degree of agreement or disagreement with a variety of statements related to the attitude object • Summated Scale • Scores on individual items are summed to give total score for respondents • Likert Scale Is Uni-dimensional Aaker, Kumar, Day

Multiple-item Scales (Contd.) Thurstone Scales • Also known as the method of equal-appearing intervals; objective is to obtain a unidimensional scale with interval properties Step 1: • Generate a large number of statements or adjectives reflecting all degrees of favorableness toward the attitude of objects Step 2: • A group of judges is given this set of items and asked to classify them according to their degree of favorableness or unfavorableness Aaker, Kumar, Day

Multiple-item Scales (Contd.) Thurstone Scales (Cont.) Advantages • Easy to administer • Requires minimum instructions Limitations • Time consuming • Expensive to construct • Not as much diagnostic value as a Likert scale • Values depend on the attitudes of the original judges Aaker, Kumar, Day

Multiple-item Scales (Contd.) Semantic-differential Scale • Respondents rate each attribute object on a number of five or seven-point rating scales bounded by polar adjectives or phrases • With bipolar scale, the midpoint is a neutral point Aaker, Kumar, Day

Characteristics of Semantic Differential Scales in Semantic Marketing Applications: • Pairs of objects or phrases must be meaningful in market being studied and often correspond to product/service attributes • Avoid "halo" effect by placing negative pole on either side • Category increments are treated as interval scales so group mean values can be computed for each object on each scale • May also be analyzed as a summated rating scale Aaker, Kumar, Day

Characteristics of Semantic Differential (Contd.) Profile Analysis • Application of semantic differential scale • Plot mean ratings of each object on each scale for visual comparison • Overall comparison of brands hard to grasp with many brands and attributes • Not all attributes are independent Aaker, Kumar, Day

Multiple-item Scales (Contd.) Stapel Scales • Uses one pole rather than two opposite poles • Respondents select a numerical response category • High positive score reflects good fit between adjective and object • Easy to administer and construct • No need to assure bipolarity Aaker, Kumar, Day

Multiple-item Scales (Contd.) Associative Scaling • Most effective for markets where respondent is knowledgeable only about a small subset of a large number of choices • Appropriate to choice situations that involve a sequential decision process • Best suited to market tracking where the emphasis is on understanding shifts in relative competitive positions Aaker, Kumar, Day

Multiple-item Scales (Contd.) Continuous Rating Scales • Respondents rate objects by placing a mark at appropriate position on a line running from one extreme of the criterion variable to the other • Values can be interpreted as interval or ratio scaled data • It is easy to construct • Scoring is cumbersome and unreliable Aaker, Kumar, Day

General Guidelines For Developing A Multiple-Item Scale Determine clearly what you are going to measure Generate as many items as possible Ask experts in the field to evaluate the initial pool of items Determine the type of attitudinal scale to be used Aaker, Kumar, Day

Include some items that will help in the validation of the scale Administer the items to an initial sample Evaluate and refine the items Finally, optimize the scale length Aaker, Kumar, Day

Choosing An Attitudinal Scale Problems in choosing • There are many different techniques, each with its own strengths and weaknesses • Virtually any technique can be adapted to the measurement of any one of the attitude components Researchers choice shaped by: • The specific information required • Adabtability of the scale to the data collection method and budget constraints • Compatibility of the scale with the structure of the respondent’s attitude Aaker, Kumar, Day

Accuracy of Attitude Measurements Validity • An attitude measure has validity if it measures what it is supposed to measure Face Validity • The extent to which the content of a measurement scale appears to tap all relevant facets of the construct Criterion Validity • Based on empirical evidence that the attitude measure correlates with other “criterion” variables Aaker, Kumar, Day

Accuracy of Attitude Measurements (Cont.) Concurrent validity • Two variables are measured at the same time Predictive validity • The attitude measure can predict some future event Convergent validity • A form of construct validity that represents the association between the measured construct and measures of other constructs with which the construct is related on theoretical grounds Aaker, Kumar, Day

Accuracy of Attitude Measurements (Cont.) Discriminant validity • A form of construct validity that represents the extent to which the measured construct is not associated with which the construct is related on theoretical grounds Construct Validity • A scale evaluation criterion that relates to the underlying question "what is the nature of the underlying variable or construct measured by the scale?" Aaker, Kumar, Day

Accuracy of Attitude Measurements (Contd.) Reliability • The consistency with which the measure produces the same results with the same or comparable population Sensitivity • Extent to which ratings provided by a scale are able to discriminate between the respondents who differ with respect to the construct being measured Aaker, Kumar, Day

Accuracy of Attitude Measurements (Contd.) Generalizability • Refers to the ease of scale administration and interpretation in different research settings and situations Relevancy • Relevance = reliability * validity Aaker, Kumar, Day

Scales in Cross-national Research Responses Can Be Affected by: • Low literacy and educational levels • Culture in a country • Semantic differential scale is closest to pan cultural scale • Adapting response formats, particularly their calibration, for specific countries and cultures Aaker, Kumar, Day

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