Measuring social science concepts in pharmacy education research: From definition to item analysis of self-report instruments.

MY ISSUE: Interpreting results from quantitative research can be difficult when measures of concepts are constructed poorly, something that can limit measurement validity.

METHODS: Social science steps for defining concepts, guidelines for limiting construct-irrelevant variance when writing self-report questions, and techniques for conducting basic item analysis are reviewed to inform the design of instruments to measure social science concepts in pharmacy education research.

MY RECOMMENDATIONS AND THEIR APPLICATIONS: Based on a review of the literature, four main recommendations emerge: These include: (1) employ a systematic process of conceptualization to derive nominal definitions; (2) write exact and detailed operational definitions for each concept, (3) when creating self-report questionnaires, write statements and select scales to avoid introducing construct-irrelevant variance (CIV); and (4) use basic item analysis results to inform instrument revision.

POTENTIAL IMPACT: Employing recommendations that emerge from this review will strengthen arguments to support measurement validity which in turn will support the defensibility of study finding interpretations. An example from pharmacy education research is used to contextualize the concepts introduced.