Impact of size revisited: relation of number of residents to self-determination and deprivatization.

Research suggests that, contrary to common expectations, size does not have an impact on quality of care in residential facilities for people with mental retardation. In the present study conducted in Norway, the impact of number of residents on two quality of care measures--deprivatization and self-determination--was analyzed. The argument was made that the lack of positive findings in earlier research may have been due to the following reasons: (a) the living unit not the facility is the appropriate focus of analysis and (b) the effect of size is nonlinear and makes a difference only within a size range outside the range included in many earlier studies. Data from Norwegian facilities support these arguments: Living unit size had a substantial impact on self-determination and deprivatization in the 1 to 5 size range but not among larger units.