A researcher is trying to find out which cereal is the favorite among five year old children in a certain community. A few cereals are mentioned over and over again and some cereals are barely mentioned. In reporting which cereal was the favorite, would the mean, the median or the mode be best to use? Why?

This is only a nominal scale.

Measurement scales

I. Nominal scale — names or classifies only (social security number, baseball, football examples). Mode only used.

II. Ordinal scale — also ranks beside naming (baseball standings, beauty pageant examples). Most psychological tests are only ordinal scales. Median and Mode used.

III. Interval scale — beside previous qualities, also has equal intervals and an arbitrary zero (centigrade/Celsius thermometer example). All used, but mean most influenced by deviant scores.

IV. Ratio scale — also has a true/absolute zero, which allows comparisons in terms of ratios (Kelvin thermometer, height/weight exams). Math uses ratio scale.

I hope this helps. Thanks for asking.