| While quality of life (QOL) is a rapidly growing area within psychology, many QOL assessment instruments currently in use have not been created or fully validated from a psychometric perspective. Additionally, few QOL measures seek to represent the specific experiences of senior citizens, particularly from a perspective emphasizing wellness rather than illness. The purpose of this investigation was to develop and validate a quality of life scale targeted for primarily healthy, community-dwelling elderly. Senior citizens were interviewed in focus groups to identify life areas that contribute significantly to their individual evaluation of their quality of life. Comments made in these focus groups, combined with a careful review of existing measures of quality of life, were used to write items reflecting the experience of community-dwelling elderly. The resulting scale was titled the Quality of Life Scale for the Elderly (QLSE). The QLSE was administered to a sample of community-dwelling elderly (N = 399) to determine its psychometric characteristics. Item analyses and exploratory factor analyses were used to revise and refine the measure. Preliminary analyses suggested a 5-factor solution: Community/Social Involvement, Positive Health Perceptions, Resources, Independence, and Interference. Confirmatory factor analyses using item parcels suggested that the 5-factor model provided a good fit to the data. The QLSE was positively related to other indexes of quality of life, such as the SF-36 and Quality of Well-Being Scale - Self-Administered. Correlations between QLSE subscales and other quality of life measures revealed the uniqueness of QLSE scales in assessing areas not commonly addressed in quality of life measurement. It was demonstrated through group differences analyses that the QLSE is able to discriminate between more and less healthy groups of individuals. Further validation analyses also indicated that the QLSE provided a more psychological and individualized approach to quality of life assessment than existing measures. |
