An evaluation of the CASP-12 scale used in the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) to measure Quality of Life among people aged 50+

This article evaluates the CASP-12 scale used in the Survey of Health, Aging and Retirement in Europe (SHARE). The CASP-12 is a shorter version of the CASP-19, a measure of quality of life (QoL) in older ages. The CASP-19 is based on a sociological conceptualization of QoL that draws upon the “Theory of Human Need” and has four dimensions: Control, Autonomy, Self-realization and Pleasure. We evaluate the structure of the SHARE version of the CASP scale using internal consistency analyses, factor analyses and item-total Spearman correlations. In addition, we assess whether that structure is invariant across the various countries participating in SHARE. Finally, we propose and test a revised scale based on our
results. The structure postulated by the authors of the CASP-19 could not be replicated with the CASP-12 scale used in SHARE. Factor analyses results suggest a revised scale with ten items instead of twelve, and two factors instead of four. Cross-country comparisons showed that results were similar in all but two countries, Italy and Portugal.