Attitude Scale comm 333

I am writing this blog for my Persuasion communication classes at Old Dominion University. We are reviewing the similarities and differences between different scales used to analyze why people think the way they do and what measurements we can use to determine it. There are many pros and cons to these different scales, and one scale is not considered to be perfect. They range from questioning participants based off of pictures of how they are feeling to asking someone to read a statement and pick from a range of how much they agree or disagree.

For example, the Likert scale is used to measure a person's values, morals, behavior changes, knowledge, perception of things, and attitudes. To test these categories, they give a participant a survey of statements and they have to choose between five options ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree. These types of surveys are most commonly used today. They are mainly used to get a sense of whether a customer is happy with the service they got or the experience they had. One example I have had recently with using this scale is when I bought my new Macbook laptop. Once I had purchased it, I got a survey in my email asking about my experience with the employee that helped me out. It asked me a series of questions about what she told me about their company, how persuaded I felt by her to buy a computer, and about her general knowledge of the products and her friendliness. The survey was a nice way to get a more specific idea on the employee. However, with those types of surveys, some people just put strongly agree for everything to get it over with so it does not truly measure what they are asking.

The visually oriented scale allows participants to express their attitudes based off of what they think themselves, not what a survey tells us. It gives them a variety of pictures of someone's face with different emotions a person can have, from happiness to sadness to fear. The person then has to point at which one they are feeling about a statement or an object. One example is when you go to the doctors. Especially with younger children, the doctor will pull out a chart and have them point to the amount of pain they are feeling. This scale works really well with children and people who may not be able to pinpoint what they are feeling. However, the cons of this scale is that not everyone looks the same when they are experiencing emotions, leading to a not completely accurate scale.

The elaboration likelihood model of persuasion (EML) tests people's attitudes and the way they think. Whether someone needs to know all of the details about a topic to make a choice or they just do what everyone else is doing. The likert scale more accurately represents the ELM because they both relate to someone's attitude of something based off of how likely they are to agree or disagree. For example, in the elaboration likelihood model, it tests two different ways of someone's behavior, whether they think more critically, or they just go with the flow and follow what everyone else is doing. This ties into the likert scale because you see both sides. Someone who actually is trying to fill out the surveys to the best of their ability, and someone who is just putting the same answer for every question. With the theory of reasoned actions (TRA), it tests one's actions versus their intentions. It states that just because someone intends to do something, it does not mean that they will 100% do that thing. The odds are higher for them to do the task, but it is never guaranteed.

I have learned quite a bit from these types of scales and models. The main thing I take away from this is that there is not a foolproof method of testing someone's attitude, but there's an easier way to test how they think. With one's thinking, it is easier to test because you can collect past and present data on the decisions they make and how/why they made them. With how someone feels, it's harder to measure that because they may not be completely honest, or they may not know exactly what they are feeling or how to express it.