United States Department of Agriculture
RMRATE is a computer program for analyzing rating judgments. The program should be useful to practitioners needing to summarize or analyze rating data, and to researchers interested in comparing and evaluating alternative scaling methods.
RMRATE scales ratings using several scaling procedures and compares the resulting scale values. The scaling procedures include the median and simple mean, standardized values, scale values based on Thurstone's Law of Categorical Judgment, and regression-based values. RMRATE also computes reliability statistics and analyzes the ratings using principal component analysis techniques to assess variation among judges.
More information on RMRATE is available in the publication Analysis of ratings: A guide to RMRATE (GTR-RM-195).
RMRATE was originally developed to analyze ratings of forest scenic beauty. Several publications about measuring forest scenic beauty are available from RMRS.
To download and install RMRATE for Windows, save the install file (rmrate.exe, 3 MB) to a temporary folder on your hard drive. Then double-click on the file to extract the RMRATE installation and sample files.
For detailed instructions on installation and operation, refer to the RMRATE documentation below.
A "Quick start" user's guide to RMRATE (195 KB pdf file)
The "Quick start" guide includes instructions to run a sample data file that produces the outputs illustrated in An analysis of ratings: A guide to RMRATE.
Brown, Thomas C., Terry C. Daniel, Herbert W. Schroeder, Glen E. Brink. 1990. An analysis of ratings: A guide to RMRATE. Gen. Tech. Rep. RM-195. Fort Collins, CO: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Forest and Range Experiment Station. 40 p. (564 KB pdf file)
This report describes RMRATE, a computer program for analyzing rating judgments. This publication is out of print but is accurately reproduced in a PDF file. It states that the computer program RMRATE is available by writing to the authors, but the program is now available online for download (rmrate.exe, 3 MB). Also, it describes the process for creating the file containing the input parameters to run RMRATE, but the new version of RMRATE available at this web site comes with a new sample file described in the "Quick start guide".
Rating scales provide an efficient and widely used means of recording judgments. This paper reviews scaling issues within the context of a psychometric model of the rating process, describes several methods of scaling rating data, and compares the methods in terms of the assumptions they require about the rating process and the information they provide about the underlying psychological dimension being assessed.
RMRATE runs on a personal computer with Microsoft Windows 95/NT.
Brown, Thomas. RMRATE. Available online at https://www.fs.fed.us/rmrs/tools/rmrate.
The version of RMRATE available for downloading from this web site is a Windows version of the original DOS application described in the 1990 publication Analysis of ratings: A guide to RMRATE (GTR-RM-195).