Which level of measurement arranges cases in rank positions?

• A. Nominal
• B. Interval
• C. Ordinal
• D. Ratio

Answer: (C)

Ranking is the hallmark of the ordinal level. It lets you place cases in a specific order—from least to greatest or most to least—so you know which item comes before another. But it doesn’t tell you how big the gap is between adjacent items, and it doesn’t assume equal intervals. For example, a clinician might use categories like mild, moderate, and severe, or a Likert-type rating from 1 to 5; you can say one level is higher than another, but you can’t quantify the exact difference between them. This distinguishes ordinal data from nominal data (which has no inherent order) and from interval or ratio data (which involve numeric differences and, in the case of ratio data, a true zero).