Observed vs. self-reported agricultural activities: Evaluating 24-hr recall in a pilot study

Area of Science:

• Agricultural science
• Occupational health
• Biomonitoring

Background:

• Accurate self-reporting of work activities is crucial for exposure assessment in occupational health studies.
• Objective measures are often challenging to obtain, limiting the validation of self-reported data.
• Previous research has not extensively evaluated the reliability of farmers' recall of daily agricultural tasks.

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess the validity of self-reported agricultural activities by comparing farmers' recall to direct observation.
• To determine the accuracy of participant recall for specific farming tasks conducted the previous day.
• To provide evidence for the reliability of self-reported data in agricultural exposure studies.

Main Methods:

• Compared self-reported agricultural activities of 32 farmers with direct observations made during air monitoring.
• Collected data over 56 visits, with air monitoring preceding interviews about the previous day's activities.
• Calculated overall agreement, sensitivity, specificity, and kappa for 14 distinct agricultural activities.

Main Results:

• High agreement between recalled and observed activities, with a median overall agreement of 95%.
• Median sensitivity was 84% and median specificity was 95%, indicating good accuracy in recall.
• Kappa values indicated good to perfect agreement for most tasks, suggesting reliable self-reporting.

Conclusions:

• Participant recall of agricultural activities from the previous day is generally accurate and reliable.
• Self-reported data can be a valid tool for assessing farmer exposures when objective measures are difficult.
• Findings support the use of self-reported work activities in future occupational health and agricultural studies.