| This study examines the feasibility of developing a questionnaire designed to evaluate Quality of Life for Developmentally Handicapped (DH) and normal adolescents. The sample consists of 235 high school students (DH = 51 and normals = 184) enrolled in the South-Western City School District in Grove City, Ohio. The students range in age from 14-19 years. The QOL Questionnaire consists of 160 yoked items developed to measure the degree of satisfaction currently experienced by high school students in common areas of life activity. Common areas of life activity are defined in this study as the domains of socialization, recreation, education, and vocation. The QOL Questionnaire was administered in a group setting during the regular school day.;Significant levels of internal reliability were obtained for the DH group for the recreation domain, education domain, and overall measure. A significant level of internal reliability was obtained for the normal group for the education domain. Significant mean rating differences existed between the groups for the recreation domain, education domain, and overall total rating with the normals having a higher rating of QOL in each case. This study indicates that the development of a QOL Questionnaire to adequately measure the QOL of normal and DH adolescents is feasible. The measure was also able to identify differences between the groups. |
