The quantification of social contacts and resources / Cathy A. Donald, John E. Ware, Jr. ; prepared under a grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Format:

Book

Government document

Author/Creator:

Donald, Cathy A., 1947-

Contributor:

United States. Department of Health and Human Services.

Rand Corporation.

Ware, John E.

Series:

R (Rand Corporation)

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Social medicine--Methodology.

Social medicine.

Health status indicators.

Social interaction.

Health surveys.

Social medicine--United States.

Health status indicators--United States.

Social interaction--United States.

Health surveys--United States.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xxi, 228 pages) : illustrations

Place of Publication:

Santa Monica, CA : RAND Corporation, [1982]

Summary:

This report presents the results from empirical tests of strategies for scoring social well-being items fielded by RAND's Health Insurance Experiment (HIE). Section II presents background material, a conceptual framework for social well-being measurements, an outline of measurement issues and strategies involved in quantifying questionnaire responses, and a summary of how other investigators have constructed social well-being measures. Section III describes the methodology used in the HIE. Sections IV and V present results of empirical analyses, recommend a scoring rule for each of the 11 HIE social well-being items, and describe the results of scaling analyses including descriptive statistics, interrelationships among measures, the reliability of resulting scores, associations between social well-being measures and selected sociodemographic and health variables, and effects of socially desirable responding on social well-being measures. Section VI discusses the findings and offers suggestions for future research based on the experiences with HIE measures.

Notes:

"Prepared under a grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services."

"October 1982."