Activity Analysis: Agreement between Participants and Observers on Perceived Factors in Occupation Components

Abstract

This study is part of research being conducted to test the validity and reliability of activity analysis in occupational therapy. The objective was to determine the percentage of agreement between participants in an activity and observers of the activity using self-report as the method of data collection. The study was designed to determine the agreement on subjects' perceptions of presence or absence of 29 factors in five occupation components related to chewing, buttoning, manual rolling, drawing, and spinning.

Eighty occupational therapy students were participants in a laboratory used to gather self-report data in the initial study. Each student engaged in an activity that required chewing, buttoning, manual rolling, drawing, and spinning. Forty-seven registered occupational therapists were participants in this study. They observed a videotape of a student subject who performed the five activity (occupation) components. The student participant self-report responses are compared with the responses reported by the occupational therapist observers to determine the extent to which the two groups agreed on the presence of the activity factors.

The results of the study indicated that agreement occurred between the two groups for 12 to 21 of the 29 factors across the five occupation components. This finding occurred 80% or more of the time with a calculated percentage of agreement of .724 for spinning, manual rolling, and buttoning.