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- 1). Create several qualitative categories. These can be categories that measure observations such as; intensity, taste, appearances or satisfaction. For example, you might want to make a chart that looks at the freshman class at a college. The categories could be based on levels of involvement and could be: school government involvement, school spirit activities, academic community involvement and intramural sports involvement.
- 2). Create how you intend to measure each of the levels of involvement. In this case, if measuring involvement you might want to create a simple inquiry that reflects low to high involvement. This can be divided into 3-4 levels. In our example we will use: not involved, slightly involved, moderately involved and actively involved. In developing these measures, you will want to make sure that you are clear as to what each level means and remember to remain consistent with these definitions.
- 3). Create a chart with chart paper and a ruler, which has the rows and columns needed to fit the amount of number of categories and measures consistent with your study. In this example, there are 4 categories and 4 measures. Place your categories in individual in boxes to the left of the chart and allow them to extend to rows across. Place the measures of involvement in individual boxes across the top of the chart and allow them to extend to columns downward on the chart.
- 4). Collect your information by asking the appropriate questions represented in your chart. Once you have accumulated and finished this, prepare the data for the positioning on the chart. There are two common choices for this. One option is to simply write in the matching row and column, the actual number of persons who answered. For example for civic involvement 28 people may have entered not involved, 20 may have entered slightly involved and so on. Another option would be to calculate the percentages of those answered and present that information in the appropriate box.
- 5). Check all information. Take the first row and add all numbers from left to right. This amount should equal the amount of persons in your study if you chose to enter simple numbers. If you chose to enter percentages, the amount to the final right margin should equal 100%. This information can be displayed as is or can be transposed into other chart forms such as bar charts, graphs or pie charts.
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