ABSTRACT
In social science research, it is quite common for researchers to measure a single construct using more than one item. This is especially common in survey research. For example, in my own research examining student motivation, I have often given students surveys that asked them about their interests, values, and goals. And I have used several survey items to measure each of these constructs . To measure how much students value what they are learning in school, I have often used a commonly used measure developed by Eccles and her colleagues (Eccles et al., 2004) that includes three statements, and students indicate how much they agree or disagree with each statement: (1) The information we learn in this class is interesting; (2) The information we learn in this class is important; (3) The information we learn in this class will be useful to me.
