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Definition
The feeling thermometer, or thermometer scale, is a rating procedure to measure respondents’ feelings about an issue using a scale that corresponds or makes a metaphor to temperatures in the thermometer.
Description
A feeling thermometer, or a thermometer scale, is a procedure used in survey research to measure feeling. Respondents are given instructions to express their feelings in numbers using the thermometer for temperatures as a reference or an analogy. Positive feelings are labelled as warm feelings and negative feelings are equivalent to cold feelings. It aims to measure the direction of the attitude and also to assess the degree or intensity of the feeling (Alwin, 2007, p. 188). The underlying assumption of thermometer scales is based in information theory: more precise information can be obtained if respondents can give their answer in a continuum or in a large number of categories (Alwin, 1992, 1997, 2007; Saris, 1988, 1998;...
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References
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Zavala-Rojas, D. (2014). Thermometer Scale (Feeling Thermometer). In: Michalos, A.C. (eds) Encyclopedia of Quality of Life and Well-Being Research. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0753-5_1028
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0753-5_1028
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