Measuring Within- and Between-Group Agreement: Identifying the Proportion of Shared and Unique Beliefs Across Samples

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Abstract
Questions about culture sharing and uniqueness can be addressed by measuring the amount of agreement within and between groups. This article describes methods to measure withinand between-sample agreement with particular emphasis on finding, using, and interpreting agreement. The discussion focuses on the case of a single set of related questions asked of two or more groups of informants, but the methods apply to the more general case with a set of related variables recorded for two or more sample units (e.g., culture traits or inventory materials). Methods are illustrated with Weller and Baer's study of withinand between-group agreement for four Latino samples for beliefs about each of five illnesses (AIDS, diabetes, the common cold, empacho, and mal de ojo ).