Combined Statistical and Subjective Scoring of Word Associations

Abstract

Word-association responses given by schizophrenic and disturbed adolescent patients were scored by 76 male and 73 female college undergraduates to test the feasibility of a new scaling procedure designed for use in research on psychopathology. Ss' normative probability estimates and judgments of associative strength of stimulus-response pairs were compared with scaling on the basis of Es' 7-point scaling procedure, involving 4 normatively based and 3 subjectively based categories placed on one continuum. It was found that Ss' probability estimates and associative judgments were significantly correlated ( p < .05) with each other, with actual normative probabilities, and with Es' combined statistical and subjective scoring. Duncan range tests showed Ss' ability to distinguish, in general, the different scoring categories of Es' system.