Measurement Scale

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Stevens, S. S. 1946. Theory of Scales of Measurement. Science 103: 677-680.

 

Stevens' Classification of Scales (after Stevens, 1959, p.25, 27)

Scale

Operation

Location

Dispersion

Association

Test

Nominal

Equality

Mode

 

 

Chi-Square

Ordinal

Greater or less

Street numbers

Raw scores

Median

Percentiles

Interval

Distance

Arithmetic mean

Standard deviation

Product-moment correlation

t-test F-test

Ratio

Ratio

Geometric mean Harmonic Mean

Percent variation

 

 

Measurement Scales

Scales

 

The way different things are classified has a lot to do with how they can be evaluated.  There is large and active body of literature outside of plant pathology dealing with the theory of measurement scales.  Apparently one of the first important papers in this area was by Stevens (1946), and this is still often cited.   Stevens identified several types of scales (Table below), with Nominal, Ordinal and Interval probably being the most important.

 

For more help on this see the following link.

Here is a set of examples on improper use of scales: link.