I was back in the literature today, continuing my search for test-retest reliability work on self-efficacy scales within an elderly population. Again, this was very interesting both because self-efficacy is a construct which allows for the creation of a task or skill specific self-efficacy scale for virtually anything that requires ability (e.g. 'partnership efficacy'; 'falls efficacy'; 'bicultural self-efficacy'; etc...) AND because there are special considerations with regard to the idea of efficacy in an elderly population. One study, for example, noted that cognitive impairment of their elderly participants affected test-retest scores, so this is something we may want to consider in our work.

So far, while some test-retest work allows for more brief (e.g. 5-7 days) time between tests and some allows for rather large time between tests (e.g. one year) by far the majority of studies reviewed to date use about two weeks between tests.

As we (myself, Dr. Stadtlander and Dr. Giles) discussed earlier on a teleconference, time frame may have unique meaning in our population. Certainly, our population could have a significant change in health status rather quickly and this is something we must consider.