All,
I have received a number of responses and they have been helpful.
To provide some context, I am a new department chair and am challenging
the ways in which my institution "analyzes" and applies Likert type data
in student evaluations of teaching and was confronted with the common
belief among people that these type of data are interval scale data while
I have always viewed them as ordinal scale and used statistical methods
appropriate to ordinals scale data when confronted with these types of
data. I was told that the reason we should treat them as interval scale
data is that "everybody does it" As it turns out, it appears that not
everyone does it.
I was interested to see if this belief was commonly held by members of my
ow field of study (ecology) a group that, by necessity has often undergone
good statistical training.
Most of those who have answered seem to have gotten the same type of
education I received.
Thanks for participating .
Paul
--
Paul Klawinski, Ph.D.
Monte Harmon Professor of Biology | Department of Biology
816-415-7628 (office) | 816-781-7700 ext. 5565 (lab)
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