ABSTRACT
Scaling is an activity with different meanings. For a mountaineer, it is synonymous with climbing; for the angler, it is synonymous with cleaning a fish. For the psychometrician, scaling would appear to be synonymous with measurement. The choice of scale may seem straightforward when measurement is practiced in the physical sciences, but this is only because so much work has been invested behind the scenes to ensure that units for measurement have been standardized, and therefore do not depend upon the objects being measured, or the instrument being used to measure. Torgerson defined an attribute as a measurable property of a person; measurable in the sense that people believe that the attribute exists, and that it exists in an amount that can be gradated. He also defined the magnitude of an attribute as a specific amount of an attribute, a point along a continuum of points.
