Credible Comparisons Using Interpersonally Incomparable Data: Nonparametric Scales with Anchoring Vignettes

Jonathan Wand

American Journal of Political Science, 2013, vol. 57, issue 1, 249-262

Abstract: Comparisons of individuals based on their selections from an ordinal scale traditionally assume that all respondents interpret subjective scale categories in exactly the same way. Anchoring vignettes have been proposed as a method to replace this homogeneity assumption with individual‐specific data about how each respondent uses the ordinal scale. However, improving interpersonal comparisons with anchoring vignettes also requires a new set of assumptions. In this article, I derive the assumptions needed to make credible nonparametric comparisons using anchoring vignettes, and propose a new nonparametric scale that does not assume homogeneity among respondents. I also provide methods for evaluating empirically whether a set of anchoring objects can produce credible nonparametric interpersonal comparisons. Two empirical studies illustrate the importance of accounting for differences in the use of ordinal scales by showing how our inferences about interpersonal comparisons may change as a function of the assumptions we accept.

Date: 2013
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-5907.2012.00597.x

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wly:amposc:v:57:y:2013:i:1:p:249-262

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in American Journal of Political Science from John Wiley & Sons
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().