Spanish adaptation and validation of the Family Quality of Life Survey.
The Spanish FQOL Survey is valid and reliable, but check item clarity when you move to new Spanish-speaking regions.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team translated the Family Quality of Life Survey into Spanish. They tested it with Colombian families who have a member with a disability.
They checked if the five parts of the survey still held together. They also checked if answers stayed the same when families took it twice.
What they found
The Spanish survey kept the same five areas: family interaction, parenting, emotional well-being, physical well-being, and disability support.
Answers were steady over time. Internal reliability was strong. The tool is ready to use.
How this fits with other research
Cançado et al. (2011) looked at 16 FQOL tools and said the field needs stricter psychometric work. The 2005 Spanish study answers that call by showing clean factor structure.
Hattier et al. (2011) later used the same method on three more Beach Center scales for Spanish families. They built on the 2005 work and widened the toolkit.
Guerrero et al. (2025) tried the Spanish survey in rural Peru. They found most items needed re-wording. This warns you to test wording with each new region, even when the language is the same.
Why it matters
You now have a free, Spanish, psychometrically sound FQOL survey. Use it during intake to learn how services affect the whole family, not just the client. If you work with rural or low-literacy groups, pilot each item first and simplify wording.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
BACKGROUND: Assessing the quality of life (QOL) for families that include a person with a disability have recently become a major emphasis in cross-cultural QOL studies. The present study examined the reliability and validity of the Family Quality of Life Survey (FQOL) on a Spanish sample. METHOD AND RESULTS: The sample comprised 385 families who were administered the FQOL in Cali, Columbia. The FQOL showed adequate temporal stability (r = 0.68 on Importance and r = 0.78 on Satisfaction) and excellent internal consistency: Cronbach's alpha of 0.96 for Importance and 0.95 for Satisfaction. The confirmatory factor analysis yielded high fit indices, thus confirming that the factor structure of the FQOL as adapted for Spanish people fitted the five-factor model proposed by the survey's authors. CONCLUSIONS: The study provides a valid instrument for the research of the QOL of those families that have a child with a disability within Spanish-speaking community.
Journal of intellectual disability research : JIDR, 2005 · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2788.2005.00754.x