The Role of Scales on Evaluations of Identical Goal Progress

People often use different measurement scales due to personal, social, cultural, economical, or technical reasons as well as simple convenience. The naive act of using different ways to measure progress may lead two people to feel very differently about their levels of goal accomplishment even when they have totally identical achievements. For example, imagine that Mark and Jessica run a lap around town covering 2.23 miles of distance every day. Mark is keeping track of the total distance he runs in miles, whereas Jessica is counting the number of days she runs. Both of them run for 9 days completing 20 miles each. The purpose of our research, therefore, was to examine scale-induced roundness and numerosity effects and show how use of different measurement scales affect perceptions and evaluations of progress and feeling of achievement. In a recent study Gunasti and Ozcan found that round numbers create a sense of completeness, fullness or wholeness especially in brand names domain.