Abstract
Objective
This study examined the validity of child-reported exposure to secondhand smoke (SHS)
and investigated factors, such as child's age, which might affect accuracy of recall.
Study Design and Setting
Participants were drawn from a nonprobability sample of 380 families who completed
baseline assessment as part of a randomized trial of an SHS reduction intervention
conducted in an urban setting in Southern California. Parents and children (aged 8–13
years) retrospectively reported child's exposure to SHS using timeline followback
methodology; reports were compared with child's urine cotinine.
Results
Validity coefficients for parents and children were comparable (r=0.58 vs. r=0.53), but parents recalled three times more exposure than children (2.2 vs. 0.8 cigarettes
per day; P<0.001). Regression models predicting cotinine indicated that including child in addition
to parent reports resulted in better prediction than either alone.
Conclusion
When there is a choice, parent reports are preferable over child reports because of
decreased underreporting. However, child-reported SHS exposure had adequate validity
(r>0.50) and might be appropriate in some situations. Researchers might consider collecting
both parent and child reports because each made a unique contribution to the prediction
of cotinine.
Keywords
To read this article in full you will need to make a payment
Purchase one-time access:
Academic & Personal: 24 hour online accessCorporate R&D Professionals: 24 hour online accessOne-time access price info
- For academic or personal research use, select 'Academic and Personal'
- For corporate R&D use, select 'Corporate R&D Professionals'
Subscribe:
Subscribe to Journal of Clinical EpidemiologyAlready a print subscriber? Claim online access
Already an online subscriber? Sign in
Register: Create an account
Institutional Access: Sign in to ScienceDirect
References
- Actual causes of death in the United States, 2000.JAMA. 2004; 291: 1238-1245
- The preventable causes of death in the United States: comparative risk assessment of dietary, lifestyle, and metabolic risk factors.PLoS Med. 2009; 6 (10.1371/journal.pmed): e1000058
- The health consequences of involuntary exposure to tobacco smoke: a report of the surgeon general.(Available at) (Accessed February 24, 2009)
- The accuracy of environmental tobacco smoke exposure measures among asthmatic children.J Clin Epidemiol. 1995; 48: 1251-1259
- Measuring ETS exposure in infants and young children through urine cotinine and memory-based parental reports: empirical findings and discussion.Tob Control. 1999; 8: 282-289
- Measuring secondhand smoke exposure in babies: the reliability and validity of mother reports in a sample of low-income families.Health Psychol. 2000; 19: 232-241
- Households contaminated by environmental tobacco smoke: sources of infant exposures.Tob Control. 2004; 13: 29-37
- Urinary cotinine and exposure to parental smoking in a population of children with asthma.Clin Chem. 1999; 45: 505-509
- Questionnaire data as predictors of urinary cotinine levels among nonsmoking adolescents.Arch Environ Health. 1993; 48: 230-234
- Reliability of proxy reports of parental smoking by elementary schoolchildren.Ann Epidemiol. 1997; 7: 396-399
- Do children with asthma and their parents agree on household ETS exposure? Implications for asthma management.Patient Educ Couns. 2004; 53: 19-25
- Accuracy of parental and youth reporting of secondhand smoke exposure: the Florida youth cohort study.Addict Behav. 2005; 30: 1555-1562
- Who underreports dietary intake in a dietary recall? Evidence from the second national health and nutrition examination survey.J Consult Clin Psychol. 1995; 63: 438-444
- The timeline followback reports of psychoactive substance use by drug-abusing patients: psychometric properties.J Consult Clin Psychol. 2000; 68: 134-144
- The use of biologic fluid samples in assessing tobacco smoke consumption.in: Grabowski J. Bell C.S. Measurement in the analysis and treatment of smoking (NIDA Research Monograph No. 48, pp. 6–26). Vol. 48. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; Public Health Service; Alcohol, Drug Abuse, and Mental Health Administration, Bethesda, MD1983: 6-26
- Standards for educational and psychological testing.American Educational Research Association, American Psychological Association, National Council on Measurement in Education, Washington, DC1999
- An empirical study of related correlation coefficients.J Educ Behav Stat. 1983; 1: 75-86
- Quantile regression.Sage, London, UK2007
- Self-report assessment of walking: effects of aided recall instructions and item order.Meas Phys Educ Exerc Sci. 2000; 4: 141-155
- Using recall cues to improve measurement of dietary intakes with a food frequency questionnaire in an ethnically diverse population: an exploratory study.J Am Diet Assoc. 2006; 106: 1209-1217
- Measuring secondhand smoke exposure in children: an ecological measurement approach.J Pediatr Psychol. 2008; 33: 156-178
Article info
Publication history
Published online: March 26, 2010
Accepted:
November 11,
2009
Identification
Copyright
© 2010 Elsevier Inc. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
