Development and standardization of scale for measurement of attitude of farm women towards agriculture as an enterprise

Introduction

India is predominantly an agrarian economy, with agriculture and allied sectors providing livelihood to a significant proportion of the population. According to Census 2011, about 54.60% of the total workforce is engaged in agriculture and allied activities. Women constitute a substantial share of this workforce and play a crucial role in sustaining agricultural production systems. The workforce participation rate of rural women is considerably higher (41.8%) compared to urban women (35.31%) (MoSPI, 2017), indicating their vital contribution to rural economic development. In rural India, agriculture and allied activities serve as the primary source of livelihood for nearly 80% of economically active women. Among them, approximately 33% are agricultural labourers, while 48% are selfemployed farmers. Rural women actively participate across the entire agricultural value chain, including pre-harvest operations, post-harvest processing, storage, packaging, and marketing, thereby enhancing farm productivity and household income. Over time, the increasing ratio of women to men in agriculture reflects their growing contribution to agricultural growth and national GDP (Pingali et al., 2019) [9] . Women engaged in farming activities are commonly referred to as farm women, defined as women belonging to farm families whose primary source of income is agriculture. Farm women shoulder multiple responsibilities simultaneously, encompassing household management, farm operations, and livestock care. Despite their extensive involvement, their role often remains under-recognized, particularly in terms of decision-making, ownership, and entrepreneurial engagement in agriculture. In Maharashtra, women account for 48.17% of the total population, of which 55.45% reside in rural areas. Notably, about 74.93% of rural women are engaged in agriculture www.extensionjournal.com and allied activities (Census, 2011) [4] . With the increasing emphasis on agriculture as an enterprise rather than a subsistence activity, understanding the attitude of farm women towards agriculture as an enterprise becomes crucial. Attitude significantly influences adoption of innovations, risk-taking behaviour, managerial efficiency, and entrepreneurial orientation. However, the availability of a standardized and reliable instrument to measure the attitude of farm women towards agriculture as an enterprise is limited. Hence, the present study was undertaken with the objective of developing and standardizing a scale to measure the attitude of farm women towards agriculture as an enterprise, which can serve as a valuable tool for researchers, extension professionals, and policy planners.

Materials and Methods

An attitude is a theoretical concept used to describe how much a person likes or dislikes something. It reflects the level of positive or negative feelings a person holds toward a particular psychological object, such as a person, idea, event, or situation. Allport (1967) [1] defined attitude as "a mental and neural state of readiness, organized through experience, exerting directive or dynamic influence upon an individual's response to all objects and situations with which it is related". The attitude was defined as the "sum total of a man's inclinations and feelings, prejudice or bias, preconceived notions, ideas, fears, threats, and convictions about any specified topic" (Thurstone, 1967) [11] . Breckler and Wiggings (1992) [3] defined attitude as mental and neural representations, organized through experience, exerting a directive or dynamic influence on behaviour. In this study, the attitude of farm women toward agriculture as an "enterprise" is operationally defined as the extent to which they hold positive or negative feelings about agriculture as a business activity.

To measure the attitude level of farm women in a systematic and accurate manner, and to ensure the proper development of the research instrument, the following steps were undertaken. 1. Item selection. 2. Preparation of statements. 3. Item analysis. 4. Testing reliability of the scale. 5. Testing validity of the scale. 6. Final format of attitude scale. 7. Administration of attitude scale 1 Item selection Seven components namely risk aversion or risk-taking ability, innovational attitude, social attitude, managerial attitude, economic attitude, perceived stressfulness, and satisfaction with agriculture as an enterprise were identified and selected to assess the attitude of farm women. These components were determined based on a review of relevant literature and consultations with extension experts.

Preparation of statements

Initially, ninety-eight statements reflecting the attitudes of farm women toward agriculture as an enterprise were developed based on available literature, research articles, publications, and consultations with specialists in extension, economics, and agricultural field officers. These statements were edited according to the criteria suggested by Thurstone (1967) [11] , Likert (1932) [6] , and Edward (1957) [5] . After the editing process, seventy-nine statements were retained out of the original ninety-eight. The selected statements were clear, non-ambiguous, and non-factual in nature.

Item analysis (Selection of the Judges)

These statements were subsequently reviewed by a panel of expert judges to assess their relevance. For this purpose, 120 judges specializing in extension education, sociology, and economics from various agricultural universities across India were selected to provide their valuable opinions on the statements. The judges were asked to rate each statement on a threepoint continuum: 'most relevant,' 'relevant,' and 'not relevant.' For positive statements, scores of 3, 2, and 1 were assigned respectively, whereas for negative statements, the scoring pattern was reversed (1, 2, and 3). The judges were also invited to suggest additional items they considered suitable for inclusion in the scale. Out of the 120 judges contacted, 91 responded and returned the duly completed schedules. The details are presented in the following table.

Relevancy test

Based on responses received from the judges, the relevancy weightage, relevancy percentage and mean relevancy score were worked out for all the 79 items individually, using the formulae given by Edward (1957) [5] . Based on these three criteria, the statements were evaluated and screened for their relevance. Statements that obtained a relevancy weightage above 0.66, a relevancy percentage exceeding 66.00%, and a mean relevancy score greater than 2 were considered suitable for assessing attitude. As a result of this screening process, a total of 46 statements were finally selected.

Relevancy weightage

Calculation of 't' value (Item analysis)

The 46 selected statements were further subjected to item analysis to identify those items that could effectively differentiate respondents with a high level of attitude from those with a low level of attitude. For this purpose, 40 respondents were chosen from non-sample areas namely Dagad Dhanora and Shembal Pimpri villages of Pusad taluka, and Mulawa and Navin Sukli villages of Umarkhed taluka in Yavatmal district through direct interviews. The respondents were asked to indicate their level of agreement or disagreement with each statement on a five-point continuum ranging from "strongly agree" to "strongly disagree." The scoring pattern ranged from 5 to 1 for positive statements, with 5 assigned to "strongly agree," 4 to "agree," 3 to "undecided," 2 to "disagree," and 1 to "strongly disagree." For negative statements, the scoring pattern was reversed. The critical ratio, or 't' value, which indicates the extent to which each statement distinguishes between the high and low respondent groups, was calculated for every item. This was done using the formula recommended by Edward (1957) [5] .

Where, Agriculture is not just an enterprise, but it is way of life.

6

In agriculture enterprise farm women get freedom to work in own way.

7

Being agriculture as an enterprise will entail great satisfaction to farm women.

2.60

Selection of statements for scale with 't' values

After calculating the 't' value for all 46 statements, only those items with a 't' value of 1.75 or higher were retained for inclusion in the scale. Consequently, 35 statements were selected for the final scale. The developed scale was then further standardized by assessing its reliability and validity.

Testing reliability of scale -test-retest method

A scale is considered reliable when it produces consistent results when used repeatedly to measure the same phenomenon. In this study, the test-retest method was used to assess reliability. The final set of 35 statements, representing the attitude of farm women toward agriculture as an enterprise, was administered on a five-point continuum to a new group of 20 respondents who were not part of the actual sample. After 15 days, the same scale was administered again to the same respondents, producing two sets of scores. The correlation coefficient between the two sets of scores was calculated. The obtained 'r' value of 0.823 was significant at the 0.01 level, indicating that the scale is highly reliable. This shows that the scale is stable and dependable in measuring the attitude of the respondents.

Testing validity of the scale

Validity refers to the extent to which an instrument measures what it is intended to measure. In this study, the developed scale was evaluated for content validity.

According to **Fred N. Kerlinger (1976), content validity is the extent to which the content of an instrument adequately represents the subject matter or domain it is intended to measure. Content validity was established for the present scale by ensuring that the items comprehensively covered the entire domain of agriculture as an enterprise. This coverage was based on a thorough review of literature and the opinions of a panel of 91 expert judges in extension education and economics. The judges assessed the relevance of the items to determine whether they should be included in the scale. Since the selected statements demonstrated high discriminating power, the scale was considered to be a valid measure of farm women's attitudes toward agriculture as an enterprise. Therefore, the scale was found to possess a satisfactory degree of validity.

Result and Discussion

The final scale which would measure the attitude of farm women toward agriculture as an enterprise was considered of 35 statements out off that 28 statements are positive statements while seven are negative statements. The 35 statements selected for the final format of attitude scale were randomly arranged to avoid response biases. The scale can be administered on five-point continuum i.e. 'strongly agree', 'agree', 'undecided', 'disagree' and 'strongly disagree' by giving score 5, 4, 3, 2 and 1 for positive statements and 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 for negative statements. Therefore, the overall possible attitude score of the individual respondent towards agriculture as an enterprise www.extensionjournal.com could range from 35 to 175. The high score of scale will represent the favorable attitude of farm women towards the agriculture as an enterprise. Thus, Attitude score of the Farm women were obtained by summation of score of all the statements included in the scale and they were grouped into three categories i.e. less favorable, moderately favorable and highly favorable by using equal interval method. Lack of labour during peak period in agriculture enterprise becomes a stressful to farm women. 4

In agriculture enterprise perishable product transportation is difficult for farm women. (-) 5

It creates tension when farm women feel unable to repay the loan towards agriculture enterprise. 6

Need to develop laws to get the property right of land to farm woman. 7

Lack of training to farm women in agriculture enterprise is stressful. G Satisfaction 1

Agriculture enterprise is able to meet the local demand of product.

Optimum utilization of farm resources is not possible in agriculture enterprise. (-) 3

Agriculture enterprise is a profession which has harmony with nature. 4

Agriculture is not just an enterprise, but it is way of life. 5

In agriculture enterprise farm women get freedom to work in own way.

Conclusion

The present study successfully developed and standardized an attitude scale to measure the attitude of farm women towards agriculture as an enterprise in the western Vidarbha region of Maharashtra. The final scale consists of 35 carefully selected statements that adequately represent the multidimensional nature of attitude related to agricultural entrepreneurship. High reliability and satisfactory content validity indicate that the scale is consistent, stable, and capable of measuring the intended construct accurately. This standardized instrument can serve as a valuable tool for researchers, policymakers, and extension professionals to diagnose attitude levels, design need-based capacitybuilding programmes, and evaluate the impact of interventions aimed at promoting agriculture as an enterprise among farm women. With suitable contextual modifications, the scale may also be applied in other regions to facilitate comparative studies and contribute to strengthening women's participation and empowerment in agriculture

References

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