Comparison of Performance-Based Observed Assessment, Self-Report, and Paper–Pencil Measures of Everyday Problem Solving in Chinese Older Adults

Abstract

The study was to verify for older adults, the applicability of a recently developed measure of everyday problem solving, a performance-based observed assessment (the Chinese Version of Observed Tasks of Daily Living [OTDL-C]), by comparing with two other measures—a self-report questionnaire and a paper–pencil test. Totally 183 older adults (aged 60–84 years) completed demographic questionnaires and three everyday problem-solving assessments. All assessments measured the same instrumental domains of daily life (medication use, phone use, electric appliance use, and financial management). We observed significant differences in inter-individual variation, and found significant differences in the effects of age and education level on OTDL-C performance compared with self-report and paper–pencil measure performance. Additionally, the inter-individual variance was significantly greater for the OTDL-C and paper–pencil test than for the self-report questionnaire. Age remained a significant predictor of OTDL-C performance after controlling the scores of the self-report and the paper–pencil measures. Education level had more consistent effects on the total score and each domain score of the OTDL-C compared to the other two measures. Overall, our finding indicated that the OTDL-C had greater inter-individual variation, might be a more sensitive tool for examining age-related differences in the ability to solve everyday problem, and could be more applicable to older populations with diverse education levels compared to the self-report and the paper–pencil measures. In circumstances where a high sensitive assessment of everyday problem solving is needed to detect individual differences, the OTDL-C might be a more appropriate choice.