Intersubjectivity of measurement across the sciences

Abstract

A critical condition for the quality of measurement results is that they be interpretable in the same way by everyone, even though they may have been obtained in different contexts by different individuals using different instruments: in other words, they should be subject-independent, or intersubjective. For both physical properties and psychosocial properties, intersubjectivity can be secured by establishing the metrological traceability of the measurement results to a measurement unit, and more generally to a set of reference properties, though at present such solutions are less commonly found in psychosocial applications. In this paper we describe traditional and newer solutions to the problem of intersubjectivity in the physical sciences, and then explore how these and other solutions can apply to non-physical measurement as well. The fact that, despite their differences, the metrological traceability to references can be structurally guaranteed in both physical and non-physical measurement and can be presented in a single and consistent framework is a significant step towards the development of a conception of measurement across the sciences.