Abstract
Reliability of self-reports in survey research is important. Little is known about
the reliability of self-reports in the very old (aged 80+). The objective of this
study is to evaluate the level of reliability in self-reports by assessing the level
of agreement between a “respondents” and their “informants” (children) as they rate
the respondent's: hearing ability; vision capacity; and nine health conditions. Descriptive
statistics, observed agreement, and kappa values are computed on 389 pairs using HEPESE
Wave-7 data (2010–2011). Although further studies are required, there is evidence
that self-reports on basic health conditions in the very old are reliable.
Key words
To read this article in full you will need to make a payment
Purchase one-time access:
Academic & Personal: 24 hour online accessCorporate R&D Professionals: 24 hour online accessOne-time access price info
- For academic or personal research use, select 'Academic and Personal'
- For corporate R&D use, select 'Corporate R&D Professionals'
Subscribe:
Subscribe to MaturitasAlready a print subscriber? Claim online access
Already an online subscriber? Sign in
Register: Create an account
Institutional Access: Sign in to ScienceDirect
References
- Reliability of self-reports: data from the Canadian multi-centre osteoporosis study (CaMos).Chronic Diseases in Canada. 2004; 25: 1-4
- The stability and reliability of self-reported drinking measures.Journal of Studies on Alcohol. 2006; 67: 738-745
- Reliability of self-reported information on skin cancer among elderly patients with squamous cell carcinoma.Annals of Epidemiology. 2011; 21: 551-554
- Influence of social desirability on age differences in self-reports of mood and personality.Journal of Personality. 2011; 79: 741-762
- Predicting discordance between self-reports of sexual behavior and incident sexually transmitted infections with African American female adolescents: results from a 4-city study.Aids and Behavior. 2012; (10.1007/s10461-012-0163-8)
- On the different scenarios of disagreement between self- and informant-reports on an aged adults ability to perform activities of daily living.Maturitas. 2012;http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.maturitas.2012.06.012
- Staging dementia using proxy-reported activities of daily living.Dementia and Geriatric Cognitive Disordered. 2011; 32: 111-117
- Comparing reports from hip-fracture patients and their proxies: implications on evaluating sex differences in disability and depressive symptoms.Journal of Aging and Health. 2012; 24: 367-383
- Use of proxies to measure health and functional status in epidemiologic studies of community-dwelling women aged 65 years and older.American Journal of Epidemiology. 1988; 143: 283-292
- Agreement between “inaccessible” respondents and informants.Public Opinion Quarterly. 1973; 36: 603-611
- The health of Mexican American elderly: selected findings from the Hispanic EPESE.in: Wykle M.L. Ford A.B. Serving minority elders in the 21st century. Springer, New York1999: 72-90
- More than just the kappa coefficient: a program to fully characterize inter-rater reliability between two raters.SAS Global Forum, Pittsburgh, PA2009
- Coefficient of agreement for nominal scales.Educational and Psychological Measurement. 1960; 20: 37-46
- Measuring nominal scale agreement among many raters.Psychological Bulletin. 1971; 76: 378-382
- Statistical methods for rates and proportions.John Wiley, New York1973
- The measurement of observer agreement for categorical data.Biometrics. 1977; 33: 159-174
- High agreement but low kappa: the problems of two paradoxes.Journal of Clinical Epidemiology. 1990; 43: 543-549
- The kappa statistic in reliability studies: use, interpretation, and sample size requirements.Physical Therapy. 2005; 85: 257-268
- Understanding interobserver agreement: the kappa statistic.Family Medicine. 2005; 37: 360-363
Article info
Publication history
Published online: October 24, 2012
Accepted:
September 28,
2012
Received in revised form:
September 6,
2012
Received:
August 21,
2012
Identification
Copyright
© 2012 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
