Development of a scale measuring barriers to going out among community-dwelling older adults

To maintain the frequency of going out and to improve homebound status among older adults, specific barriers need to be identified. Hence, this study developed a scale to measure barriers to going out.

A preliminary study was carried out to collect items for the scale. We conducted semi-structured interviews with five homebound older adults, and created 14 items as a draft barrier scale. The main study included 2273 older adults and their cohabitating family members in rural Japan. For older adults, the questions included demographic characteristics, responses to the draft scale and variables to examine its validity. For family members, the questions included demographic characteristics, their relationship with the older adult and their assessment of their older relative's willingness to go out. We used data from 892 pairs for our analysis.

We selected nine items through the criterion group strategy, and confirmed the unidimensional structure of the scale through factor analysis. The results showed significant relationships between the scale and older adults' self-efficacy about going out, their health locus of control, the frequency of going out and their reluctance to go out as assessed by family members. We carried out a receiver operating characteristic analysis to determine the scale's cut-off point. Our multivariate analysis showed that the scale had a significantly stronger association with homebound status than with other variables.

We developed a highly reliable and valid scale on barriers to going out among community-dwelling older adults and confirmed its usability. Geriatr Gerontol Int 2021; 21: 238-244.