Drews C D, Greeland S
Department of Ophthalmology, Emory University, Atlanta, GA 30322.
Int J Epidemiol. 1990 Dec;19(4):1107-12. doi: 10.1093/ije/19.4.1107.
Many authors have expressed concern that case-control differences in the accuracy of information reported in interviews may create spurious associations in epidemiological investigations. Nevertheless, the impact of differential misclassification on observed associations has not been systematically examined. This paper presents algebraic and graphical analyses of the effect of case-control differences in reporting accuracy on estimates of association and on test size. These analyses suggest that under certain circumstances, even large differences in accuracy may have a minor impact on the results of a study. Study results may be particularly resistant to differences in the sensitivity of recall when the prevalence of exposure is low. The results also illustrate how researchers may evaluate the potential impact of differential misclassification on the validity of their own investigations.
许多作者担心，访谈中所报告信息准确性方面的病例对照差异可能会在流行病学调查中造成虚假关联。然而，差异错误分类对观察到的关联的影响尚未得到系统研究。本文对报告准确性方面的病例对照差异对关联估计和检验规模的影响进行了代数和图形分析。这些分析表明，在某些情况下，即使准确性存在很大差异，对研究结果的影响也可能较小。当暴露患病率较低时，研究结果可能对回忆敏感性的差异特别不敏感。研究结果还说明了研究人员如何评估差异错误分类对其自身调查有效性的潜在影响。
