TY - JOUR
T1 - Reconstructing past occupational exposures: how reliable are women's reports of their partner's occupation?
AU - Tagiyeva, N
AU - Semple, S
AU - Devereux, G
AU - Sherriff, A
AU - Henderson, J
AU - Elias, P
AU - Ayres, Jonathan
PY - 2011/6/1
Y1 - 2011/6/1
N2 - Objectives Most of the evidence on agreement between self-and proxy-reported occupational data comes from interview-based studies. The authors aimed to examine agreement between women's reports of their partner's occupation and their partner's own description using questionnaire-based data collected as a part of the prospective, population-based Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children.
Methods Information on present occupation was self-reported by women's partners and proxy-reported by women through questionnaires administered at 8 and 21 months after the birth of a child. Job titles were coded to the Standard Occupational Classification (SOC2000) using software developed by the University of Warwick (Computer-Assisted Structured Coding Tool). The accuracy of proxy-report was expressed as percentage agreement and kappa coefficients for four-, three-and two-digit SOC2000 codes obtained in automatic and semiautomatic (manually improved) coding modes. Data from 6016 couples at 8 months and 5232 couples at 21 months postnatally were included in the analyses.
Results The agreement between men's self-reported occupation and women's report of their partner's occupation in fully automatic coding mode at four-, three- and two-digit code level was 65%, 71% and 77% at 8 months and 68%, 73% and 76% at 21 months. The accuracy of agreement was slightly improved by semiautomatic coding of occupations: 73%/73%, 78%/ 77% and 83%/80% at 8/21 months respectively. While this suggests that women's description of their partners' occupation can be used as a valuable tool in epidemiological research where data from partners are not available, this study revealed no agreement between these young women and their partners at the two-digit level of SOC2000 coding in approximately one in five cases.
Conclusion Proxy reporting of occupation introduces a statistically significant degree of error in classification. The effects of occupational misclassification by proxy reporting in retrospective occupational epidemiological studies based on questionnaire data should be considered.
AB - Objectives Most of the evidence on agreement between self-and proxy-reported occupational data comes from interview-based studies. The authors aimed to examine agreement between women's reports of their partner's occupation and their partner's own description using questionnaire-based data collected as a part of the prospective, population-based Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children.
Methods Information on present occupation was self-reported by women's partners and proxy-reported by women through questionnaires administered at 8 and 21 months after the birth of a child. Job titles were coded to the Standard Occupational Classification (SOC2000) using software developed by the University of Warwick (Computer-Assisted Structured Coding Tool). The accuracy of proxy-report was expressed as percentage agreement and kappa coefficients for four-, three-and two-digit SOC2000 codes obtained in automatic and semiautomatic (manually improved) coding modes. Data from 6016 couples at 8 months and 5232 couples at 21 months postnatally were included in the analyses.
Results The agreement between men's self-reported occupation and women's report of their partner's occupation in fully automatic coding mode at four-, three- and two-digit code level was 65%, 71% and 77% at 8 months and 68%, 73% and 76% at 21 months. The accuracy of agreement was slightly improved by semiautomatic coding of occupations: 73%/73%, 78%/ 77% and 83%/80% at 8/21 months respectively. While this suggests that women's description of their partners' occupation can be used as a valuable tool in epidemiological research where data from partners are not available, this study revealed no agreement between these young women and their partners at the two-digit level of SOC2000 coding in approximately one in five cases.
Conclusion Proxy reporting of occupation introduces a statistically significant degree of error in classification. The effects of occupational misclassification by proxy reporting in retrospective occupational epidemiological studies based on questionnaire data should be considered.
U2 - 10.1136/oem.2009.052506
DO - 10.1136/oem.2009.052506
M3 - Article
C2 - 21098830
VL - 68
SP - 452
EP - 456
JO - Occupational and Environmental Medicine
JF - Occupational and Environmental Medicine
IS - 6
ER -