SCALES FOR ASSESSING PERCEPTIONS OF HEALTH-HAZARD SUSCEPTIBILITY

Two studies examined the effectiveness of a variety of commonly used l ikelihood scales (dichotomous scale, five-point verbally-labeled scale , odds scale, percentage scale, etc.) for assessing perceptions of per sonal susceptibility to health and safety risks. Two direct evaluation criteria (subjects' ratings of how easy it was to use a scale and of how well the scale reflected their feelings) and three additional meas ures of validity and reliability (the agreement of scale-derived ranks with a direct ranking, the magnitude of correlations between risk per ceptions and appropriate risk factors, and the stability of scores ove r time) were used to compare the scales. Increasing the number of scal e categories did not necessarily improve performance. In fact, a scale with seven verbally-labeled categories performed as well as or better than other scales on all evaluation criteria. These data may help hea lth education researchers in selecting scales to measure perceptions o f susceptibility to harm.