Perceived discrimination scales must be validated down to a final item set before use.

Evidence

The first draft of the index contained 13 items, which were reduced to 10 items after the instrument was assessed for content and face validity using qualitative methods, and the final version came to 9 items after the statistical analysis. Items in this index asked about interpersonal examples of anti-Muslim discrimination, such as “You are stopped for additional security screenings at the airport because you are Muslim” and “Someone yells and/or harasses you in public because you are Muslim.” These items were answered using a 5-point scale (range: from 0 = “This has never happened to me” to 4 = “This event happened and I was extremely upset”). Responses to index items were averaged. — Naheed Ahmed, Measurement of Perceived Interpersonal…, 39

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to existing work on Islamophobia measurement and the reader’s interest in cross-cultural moral panics over Muslim identity and dress (Complaints About Immodesty Go Way Back).
• SEED: Angle: an essay on why ‘discrimination’ surveys struggle to capture emotional upset versus event frequency — the ordinal scale problem.