On the conceptual foundations of psychological measurement

Abstract

Measurement has long been an important element of epistemology in the physical sciences and natural philosophy. More recently, the psychological sciences have developed a variety of techniques that purport to be instances of measurement as well. However, it is not clear how the understanding of measurement invoked in psychological science applications accords with the understanding of measurement found in other scientific disciplines. A sharper focus on conceptual clarity and coherence across the psychological and physical sciences has the potential to add a great deal to efforts to improve such practices. In this paper, we argue that it is possible to formulate a philosophically coherent account of how measurement works in both the physical and the human sciences.