Department of Health Security, Environmental Health, National Institute for Health and Welfare, P.O. Box 95, FI-70701, Kuopio, Finland.
Social and Health, City of Kuopio, Kuopio, Finland.
BMC Pulm Med. 2018 Feb 9;18(1):32. doi: 10.1186/s12890-018-0584-x.
Questionnaires can be used to assess perceived indoor air quality and symptoms in schools. Questionnaires for primary school aged children have traditionally been parent-administered, but self-administered questionnaires would be easier to administer and may yield as good, if not better, information. Our aim was to compare the repeatability of self- and parent-administered indoor air questionnaires designed for primary school aged pupils.
Indoor air questionnaire with questions on child's symptoms and perceived indoor air quality in schools was sent to parents of pupils aged 7-12 years in two schools and again after two weeks. Slightly modified version of the questionnaire was administered to pupils aged 9-12 years in another two schools and repeated after a week. 351 (52%) parents and 319 pupils (86%) answered both the first and the second questionnaire. Test-retest repeatability was assessed with intra-class correlation (ICC) and Cohen's kappa coefficients (k).
Test-retest repeatability was generally between 0.4-0.7 (ICC; k) in both self- and parent-administered questionnaire. In majority of the questions on symptoms and perceived indoor air quality test-retest repeatability was at the same level or slightly better in self-administered compared to parent-administered questionnaire. Agreement of self- and parent administered questionnaires was generally < 0.4 (ICC; k) in reported symptoms and 0.4-0.6 (ICC; k) in perceived indoor air quality.
Children aged 9-12 years can give as, or even more, repeatable information about their respiratory symptoms and perceived indoor air quality than their parents. Therefore, it may be possible to use self-administered questionnaires in future studies also with children.
问卷可用于评估学校中儿童感知的室内空气质量和症状。传统上，针对小学生的问卷由家长来管理，但自我管理的问卷会更容易管理，并且可能会提供与家长管理问卷一样或更好的信息。我们的目的是比较为小学生设计的自我管理和家长管理室内空气问卷的可重复性。
向两所学校 7-12 岁学生的家长发送了一份关于儿童症状和学校感知室内空气质量的室内空气问卷，并在两周后再次发送。在另外两所学校中，向 9-12 岁的学生管理稍作修改的问卷，并在一周后重复。351 名（52%）家长和 319 名学生（86%）回答了第一份和第二份问卷。使用组内相关系数（ICC）和 Cohen's kappa 系数（k）评估测试-重测可重复性。
自我管理和家长管理问卷的测试-重测可重复性通常在 0.4-0.7（ICC；k）之间。在大多数症状和感知室内空气质量问题上，自我管理问卷的测试-重测可重复性与家长管理问卷相比，在相同水平或略有提高。自我管理和家长管理问卷的一致性通常<0.4（ICC；k）在报告的症状和 0.4-0.6（ICC；k）在感知的室内空气质量方面。
9-12 岁的儿童可以提供与其父母一样，甚至更多的关于他们的呼吸道症状和感知室内空气质量的可重复信息。因此，未来的研究中也可能使用自我管理问卷，甚至可以使用儿童自己完成问卷。
