Utility of Health data from Social Surveys: Is There a Gold Standard for Measuring Morbidity?
比较了自我报告发病率与医生评估发病率在预测成年人自评健康和死亡率上的效果，发现自我报告在预测上不逊于甚至优于医生评估，且对白人有效但对非裔美国人无效。
Most sociological and epidemiological studies of health status in adulthood rely on reports of morbidity from respondents to social surveys. This study compares self-reported morbidity with indicators of morbidity from physicians ‘ evaluations and examines the predictive validity of each indicator on self-assessed health and mortality in adulthood. Special attention is given to differences in the measures between white and African American adults. Adults from a large national survey received a detailed medical examination by a physician; they also were asked about the presence of 36 health conditions. Results indicate that self-reported morbidity is equal or superior to physician-evaluated morbidity in a prognostic sense. Both types of morbidity predict self-assessed health for white respondents, but physician-evaluated morbidity is not related to either self-assessed health or mortality for African American respondents.