A bit off topic, but this got me wondering: is there any field of study dedicated to quantifying multidimensional, fairly subjective measures (like one's quality as a programmer)? Just intuitively it seems like there's some process in general to map out a subject's traits across multiple dimensions, assess those in a variety of multidimensional contexts, and convey the results in a natural-language way, but I've never seen this talked about in articles like the OP's :\
There's the field of empirical computer science (for example http://www.cs.jhu.edu/~nasmith/erm/) - and I've seen a couple of articles recently pushing for a more evidence-based approach to methodology. No links, I'm afraid - can't find any - but it is out there.
Edit: the link I included is more to do with algorithms and the like, mea culpa, but there are also studies cited in books like Code Complete that cover what you mention. How recent, or how good the research is, is another matter...
