Quality of life in young people: Ratings and factor structure of the Quality of Life Profile-Adolescent Version

The purpose of the study was to provide British data relating to the 54-item Quality of Life Profile Adolescent Version (QOLPAV; Raphael et at., 1996, Journal of Adolescent Health, 19, 366-375) and to explore the underlying factor structure of the questionnaire. The relationship between demographic variables (such as social economic status, gender and ethnicity) and quality of life (QOL) were investigated. Eight hundred and ninety-nine young people aged 12-16 were recruited from secondary schools in the south of England to participate in the study. Factor analysis highlighted eight dimensions embedded within the scale, which were largely consistent with the QOL model proposed by Raphael et al. (1996, Journal of Adolescent Health, 19, 366-375). A notable exception concerned items from the subdomain of "spiritual being", which did not cluster together but dispersed across multiple factors. Exclusion of complex items and those with low loadings on subdomains resulted in a briefer scale consisting of 32 items. Of the demographic variables examined, only age was significantly associated with quality of life scores. (C) 2002 The Association for Professionals in Services for Adolescents. Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.