In the social sciences the term scaling is applied to the procedures for attempting to determine quantitative measures of subjective abstract concepts. Scaling is defined as procedure for the assignment of number for other symbols to a property of objects in order to impart some of the characteristics of numbers to the properties in question. thus we assign a number scale to the various levels of heat and cold and call it a thermometer. Scales may be easy to construct but it is difficult to assure that they measure reliably.