Developing a tool for measuring the decision-making competence of older adults.

ABSTRACT: The authors evaluated the reliability and validity of a tool for measuring older adults' decision-making competence (DMC). A sample of 205 younger adults (25-45 years), 208 young-older adults (65-74 years), and 198 old-older adults (75-97 years) made judgments and decisions related to health, finance, and nutrition. Reliable indices of comprehension, dimension weighting, and cognitive reflection were developed. Comparison of the performance of old-older and young-older adults was possible in this study, unlike previous research. As hypothesized, old-older adults performed more poorly than young-older adults; both groups of older adults performed more poorly than younger adults. Hierarchical regression analyses showed that a large amount of variance in decision performance across age groups

SUBMITTER: Finucane ML 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2918639 | biostudies-literature | 2010 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature