Consistency of judgments of a professional panel and wearers regarding characteristics of selected sleepwear fabrics

The purposes of this study were to determine the consistency of subjective ratings among four professional judges and between those judges and wearers of four fabric series nightgowns. The fabrics included: (1) 100% polyester brushed knit; (2) 100% nylon knit; (3) 80/20% acetate-polyester brushed knit and (4} 80/20% acetate-nylon brushed knit. Data were collected from 55 women who each wore and cared for two garments of differing fiber contents and evaluated them on eight performance characteristics.

The consumers rated the fabrics on the following characteristics: soil removal, colorfastness, shape retention, appearance, hand, durability and static. An overall rating was obtained by combining data for the above seven factors. The gowns were also evaluated by four professional raters on the above factors. An overall rating was also determined for these judges.

Weighted kappa and z scores were used to measure agreement between judge pairs and between each judge and the wearers for the eight factors. The researcher accepted the hypothesis that rater agreement exceed that expected by chance for all judge pairs on all factors except shape retention. However, for one judge-pair the hypothesis of agreement was not accepted for shape retention. The hypothesis of rater agreement was rejected for each of the judges and the wearers on all factors except overall rating. The hypothesis of agreement was accepted for Judge III and the wearers for the overall rating. The consumers were generally more lenient than the professionals in their evaluations of all fabric characteristics except static electricity. The judges were less critical than the wearers in assessing that factor.