Reference standards or articles having prescribed levels of damage are fabricated by monitoring an electrical property of the article material, mechanically loading the article, and removing the load when a change in electrical properties indicates a prescribed level of damage. The method and system include providing a pinned layer, a free layer, and a conductive nonmagnetic spacer layer between the pinned layer and the free layer. A digital evaluation circuit with which the statistical evaluation of the output signals generated by the comparators can be carried out is linked to the outputs of the comparators of the analog-to-digital converter.