Quantitative Measurement and the Production of Meaning

Abstract

This chapter analyzes how social scientists produce and employ measurements and quantification. It applies insights from symbolic interactionism and cognitive sociology to interrogate underlying assumptions of quantitative measurement, to show how researchers work to assign meaning to measures, and to depict measurement as an intersubjective accomplishment. The chapter develops three main ideas: 1) Measurement is a socio-cognitive operation. It is a radical form of single-mindedness, a mental attitude that focuses on one aspect of a multiform reality at the expense of anything else. Measurement produces quantitative differences among qualitatively fluid realities, and communities use those quantitative differences to demarcate and segregate entities in the qualitative continuum of reality. 2) Quantification is the result of meaningful interactions among people who work to assign meaning to different forms of measurements, and these measurements function as instruments that define situations and construct realities. 3) Measurements are the result of a cooperative effort in a network of people who act collectively and are organized through conventional means of doing things. Quantitative methods are an important part of the bank of knowledge that helps social scientists to coordinate large numbers of interrelated people who work at great social distances.