Abstract
This study analyzes the internal and external consistency of standard and alternative measures of stratification position. Researchers and theorists have used a number of concepts to describe individual's position within the stratification system, e.g., level of education, occupational prestige, and Marxist class position. The central issues of this paper are the degree to which each of the operationalizations of these concepts (current in the literature) are related to one another, the degree to which the operationalizations of each concept are related to the operationalizations of other concepts that measure stratification position, and the extent to which these operational measures are “interchangeable.” Using data collected in the SRC/CPS 1980 American National Election Study, we find the strongest relationships to exist among those indicators which measure the same concept (e.g., the NORC Prestige Scale and the Duncan SEI), although all indicators are positively related. Regression analyses employing different criterion variables as dependent variables and several measures of stratification position as independent variables reveal that these measures are not “interchangeable.”
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The authors are involved in an ongoing research project; the order in which their names appear is rotated.
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Kamieniecki, S., O'Brien, R. Are social class measures interchangeable?. Polit Behav 6, 41–59 (1984). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00988228
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00988228