Hi,
I am conducting a survey in which user's will be asked series of questions to identify effect of user's knowledge on user's attitude on digital privacy.
Section 1 is "knowledge section" in which users will be asked multiple choice questions to measure their knowledge and the data will be collected as a score.
Section 2 is "user's attitude on digital privacy" and the data will be collected from responses based on 7-point likert scale from strongly agree to strongly disagree.
Problem: If the knowledge section responses are in MCQs and Attitude section is based on likert scale then implementing a pearson correlation coefficient method is not a viable solution. How can I find the correlation between knowledge and attitude.
Vinay Dev Mudgil, from the way you have described the nature of your research, I don't see at all why you think you have a problem. It's much the same kind of problem you'd find if you correlated children's age with their height: two quite different variables are being correlated.
In essence, don't worry! Just go ahead and do it. Incidentally, if I were you, I'd be more concerned with whether or not each of the two variables was being measured appropriately.
Robert Trevethan Thank you for your response. What I've learned, pearson correlation coefficient method gives accurate results if the variables are measured on continuous scales and are linearly related. That was my concern.
"I'd be more concerned with whether or not each of the two variables was being measured appropriately." This is also my concern and I'll appreciate if you can provide me some guidance. Thank you
Vinay Dev Mudgil, just quickly, I suspect that you can regard your variables as being measured on continuous scales. To check whether they are linearly related, I recommend you obtain a scatterplot. The main thing you'd want to avoid is a curvilinear (e.g., U-shaped) relationship between your two variables.
Please forgive me if I don't spend time just now elaborating on the validity of your measures. That could take quite a lot of effort, particularly for your measure of digital privacy (e.g., whether or not you can just combine all the responses you obtain on that scale). There are methods available, e.g., exploratory factor analysis, to identify whether combining participants' scores is valid or not.
Again, please forgive me if I don't spend more time on this - at least just now. I saw your question and thought I could give you some quick advice / support. Unfortunately, I have a number of other pressing commitments at the moment.
All the best with what you're doing.
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