Development and Validation of a Scale to Measure Age Integration

Abstract

This study aims to develop and validate a scale to measure the concept of age integration. Literature review, Focus Group Interview and survey of experts in the area of social work and gerontology were conducted to develop 33 preliminary questions of age integration with various levels. A total of 700 people (male:350, female:350) over the age of 45 were responded to a questionnaire to validate this scale. The results were as follows. One of the 33 questions was deleted as it was found to have low correlations with all the other questions. Through the exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory analysis, and reliability analysis of final 32 questions, 5 factors composed of 28 items were extracted: ‘cross generational interaction in community’, ‘age-irrelevant opportunity in the employment and benefits of social security systems’, ‘age-irrelevant opportunity of social participation’, ‘cross generational interaction with family’, and ‘age-friendly infrastructure’. The results revealed that the age integration scale developed by this study has proved valid to measure the concept of age integration. Further studies would be required to confirm the validity of the scale.