Agreement between data obtained from repeated interviews with a six-years interval

The objective of the study was to compare information collected through face-to-face interviews at first time and six years later in a city of Southeastern Brazil. In 1998, 32 mothers (N=32) of children aged 20 to 30 months answered a face-to-face interview with structured questions regarding their children's brushing habits. Six years later this same interview was repeated with the same mothers. Both interviews were compared for overall agreement, kappa and weighted kappa. Overall agreement between both interviews varied from 41 to 96%. Kappa values ranged from 0.00 to 0.65 (very bad to good) without any significant differences. The results showed lack of agreement when the same interview is conducted six years later, showing that the recall bias can be a methodological problem of interviews.

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Martins,Carolina Castro, Ramos-Jorge,Maria Letícia, Cury,Jaime Aparecido, Pordeus,Isabela Almeida, Paiva,Saul Martins
Format: Digital revista
Language:English
Published: Faculdade de Saúde Pública da Universidade de São Paulo 2008
Online Access:http://old.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0034-89102008000200021
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The objective of the study was to compare information collected through face-to-face interviews at first time and six years later in a city of Southeastern Brazil. In 1998, 32 mothers (N=32) of children aged 20 to 30 months answered a face-to-face interview with structured questions regarding their children's brushing habits. Six years later this same interview was repeated with the same mothers. Both interviews were compared for overall agreement, kappa and weighted kappa. Overall agreement between both interviews varied from 41 to 96%. Kappa values ranged from 0.00 to 0.65 (very bad to good) without any significant differences. The results showed lack of agreement when the same interview is conducted six years later, showing that the recall bias can be a methodological problem of interviews.