Psychometric evaluation of a new assessment of the ability to manage technology in everyday life

Abstract

Technology increasingly influences the everyday lives of most people, and the ability to manage technology can be seen as a prerequisite for participation in everyday occupations. However, knowledge of the ability and skills required for management of technology is sparse. This study aimed to validate a new observation-based assessment, the Management of Everyday Technology Assessment (META). The META has been developed to assess the ability to manage technology in everyday life. A sample of 116 older adults with and without cognitive impairment were observed and interviewed by the use of the META when managing their everyday technology at home. The results indicate that the META demonstrates acceptable person response validity and technology goodness-of-fit. Additionally, the META can separate individuals with higher ability from individuals with lower ability to manage everyday technology. The META can be seen as a complement to existing ADL assessment techniques and is planned to be used in both research and practice.

Key words::

• Dementia
• MCI
• older adults
• IADL
• instrument development
• Rasch
• occupational therapy

Acknowledgements

The authors first of all want to thank the participants who generously demonstrated their management of everyday technology for us. We also want to thank the professionals at the investigations units who helped us to recruit participants. Particularly, the authors would like to thank Sofia Starkhammar, Monica Pantzar, Jenny Rasmussen Tjernlund, Susanne Andersson, Lizette Mårtensson, and Maria Carlsson for data collection and management.

This research was mainly funded by the Health Care Sciences Postgraduate School. Financial support was also provided through the Botkyrka community, the Swedish Brainpower and the regional agreement on medical training and clinical research (ALF) between the Stockholm County Council and the Karolinska Institutet.

Earlier preliminary results were presented at the 4th Cambridge Workshop on Universal Access and Assistive Technology, April 15, 2008, Cambridge, Great Britain and the 8th European Congress of Occupational Therapy, May 24, 2008, Hamburg, Germany.

Notes