Differential Item Functioning in the SF-36 Physical Functioning and Mental Health Sub-Scales: A Population-Based Investigation in the Canadian Multicentre Osteoporosis Study.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Self-reported health status measures, like the Short Form 36-item Health Survey (SF-36), can provide rich information about the overall health of a population and its components, such as physical, mental, and social health. However, differential item functioning (DIF), which arises when population sub-groups with the same underlying (i.e., latent) level of health have different measured item response probabilities, may compromise the comparability of these measures. The purpose of this study was to test for DIF on the SF-36 physical functioning (PF) and mental health (MH) sub-scale items in a Canadian population-based sample.

Methods

Study data were from the prospective Canadian Multicentre Osteoporosis Study (CaMos), which collected baseline data in 1996-1997. DI

SUBMITTER: Lix LM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4801323 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature