VARIABLES SCALING AND STATISTICAL

ANALYSIS IN RESEARCH

Avariableisanyentitythatcantakeondifferentvalues.
Independent variable is what you (or nature) manipulates(cause).
Dependent variable is what is affected by the independent variable--
youreffectsoroutcomes.(Effect)
Price of the Egg in
Namakkal increases
when the rain
increases in the
Arabian Sea

The most widely used classification of measurement scales are

1. Nominal Scales
2. Ordinal Scales
3. Interval Scales
4. Ratio Scales

Nominal scale
Assign subjects to groups or categories
No order or distance relationship
No arithmetic origin
Only count numbers in categories
Only present percentages of categories
Chi-square most often used test of
statistical significance

Other examples
Sex

Social status

Marital status

Days of the week (months)

Geographic location

Seasons

Ethnic group

Types of restaurants

Brand choice

Religion

Job type: executive, technical, clerical

Coded as

Coded as

Ordinal scale
Classifies data according to some order or rank; e.g. names
ordered alphabetically
With ordinal data, it is fair to say that one response is greater
or less than another.
E.g. if people were asked to rate the hotness of 3 chili
peppers, a scale of "hot", "hotter" and "hottest" could be used.
Values of "1" for "hot", "2" for "hotter" and "3" for "hottest"
could be assigned.
For example, a fast food home delivery shop may wish to ask its customers:
How would you rate the service of our staff?
(1) Excellent (2) Very Good (3) Good (4) Poor (5) Worst

Interval scale
assumes that the measurements are made in equal units.
i.e. gaps between whole numbers on the scale are equal.
e.g. Fahrenheit and Celsius temperature scales
an interval scale does not have to have a true zero. e.g. A
temperature of "zero" does not mean that there is no
temperature...it is just an arbitrary zero point.
cant perform full range of arithmetic equations. 40 degrees is
not twice as hot as 20 degrees
permissible statistics: count/frequencies, mode, median,
mean, standard deviation

 Ratio Scale is the highest level of

measurement scales. This has the properties of an
interval scale together with a fixed (absolute) zero point.
The absolute zero point allows us to construct a
meaningful ratio.
Ratio scales permit the researcher to compare both
differences in scores and relative magnitude of scores.
Examples of ratio scales include weights, lengths and
times.
For example, the number of customers of a banks ATM
in the last
three months is a ratio scale. This is because you can
compare this with previous three months.
For example, the difference between 10 and 15 minutes
is the same as the difference between 25 and 30
minutes and 30 minutes is twice as long as 15 minutes

Examples
height, weight, age,
length
time
income
market share
7
6
5

1.What is your annual income before

taxes?

$ _______

4
3
2
1
0

2. How far is your workplace from

home?
_______ kilometres

Variable

Descriptive
Statistics

Visual Presentation Method

Nominal

Percentages, mode Pie Chart

/ chi -square
Bar Chart

Ordinal

Percentile, median,
rank-order
correlation /
Friedman ANOVA

Pie Chart
Bar Chart
Linear
Ogive

Interval

Mean, standard
deviation, product
moment
correlations / ttests, ANOVA,
regression, factor
analysis

Histogram
Ogive

Ratio

Geometric and
harmonic mean,

Scatter Diagram
Box Plot

DESCRIPTIVE STATISTICS
Variable

Descriptive
Statistics

Visual Presentation Method

Nominal

Percentages, mode Pie Chart

/ chi -square
Bar Chart

Ordinal

Percentile, median,
rank-order
correlation /
Friedman ANOVA

Pie Chart
Bar Chart
Linear
Ogive

Interval

Mean, standard
deviation, product
moment
correlations / ttests, ANOVA,
regression, factor
analysis

Histogram
Ogive

Ratio

Geometric and

Scatter Diagram

Independent Variable

Dependent Variable

Tools for Analysis

Nominal (Gender, Native)

Nominal

Chi square Test

Nominal

Ordinal

Spearman Rank Correlation

Nominal (Dichotomous:
Only Two Groups)

Interval

Independent t test

Nominal (Multi group)

Interval

One way ANOVA

Nominal

Ratio

Discriminant Analysis

Intependent
Oneway ANOVA

Mann Whitney U Test

Kruskall wallis test

RaTIO AND RATIO

Correlation and Regression

OVERVIEW OF UNIVARIATE DATA ANALYSIS PROCEDURES

Univariate Procedures

Interval

1. Descriptive
a) Central
tendency

Nominal

Ordinal

A) Mean
b) Dispersion B) Standard
deviation

2. Inferential

What is the
scale level of
the variable?

z test
t test

A) Median
B) Interquartile
range
KolmogorovSmirnov test

A) Mode
B) Relative and
absolute frequency
by category

Chi-square
test
15

BIVARIATE DATA ANALYSIS PROCEDURES

Bivariate Procedures
Two interval
variables

1. Descriptive

2. Inferential

Linear correlation
coefficient ( )
Simple regression
* t test on regression
coefficient
* z test on the difference
between means
* t test on the difference
between means

Two nominal
variables

What is the
scale level of
the variable?
Two ordinal
variables
Rank correlation
coefficient
Gamma / Tau

Contingency
coefficient
Lambda

Mann-Whitney
U test
Kalmogorov Smirnov test

Chi-square
test
16

MULTI VARIATE METHODS

INTERDEPENDENCE
METHODS

DEPENDENCE
METHODS

1. Factor Analysis

Depends on:

2. Cluster Analysis

* Number of dependent
variables
* Nature of the scale of
data

3. Multi- dimensional
scaling

17

Type of Statistical Tests and its Characteristics

Hypothesis

Number of

Measurement

Testing

Samples

Scale

Test

Hypotheses

One

Nominal

Chi-square

About frequency

Two or more

Nominal

Chi-square

One (Large sample

Interval

Z Test

Distribution

Or Ratio

Hypothesis
About
means

One (small

Interval

sample

Or Ratio

Two (Large sample

Interval

t Test
Z Test

Or Ratio
Two (Small sample

Interval

t Test

Or Ratio
Three or more(Small
sample

Interval
Or Ratio

One (Large sample

Interval

ANOVA
Z Test

Or Ratio
Hypothesis
About
Proportions

One (small

Interval

sample

Or Ratio

Two (Large sample

Interval

t Test
Z Test

Or Ratio
Two (Small sample

Interval
Or Ratio

t Test