ArticleBMC medical research methodology2023
Subjective socioeconomic status: an alternative to objective socioeconomic status.
Article in BMC medical research methodology, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers.
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Who cites it
10 citing papers in PubMed.
- Sleep quality and physical activity profiles associated with quality of life, self-rated health, and happiness: A cross-sectional population study in Western Iran.Preventive medicine reports · 2026Article
- Mental health after unintended pregnancy: insights from a context with available abortion care.Archives of women's mental health · 2026Article
- Understanding Incorrectness: Structural and Ideologic Predictors of Public Knowledge About MAID Legality in the U.S.Journal of general internal medicine · 2026Article
- The effects of subjective socioeconomic status and its underestimation on physical activity: evidence from China.Frontiers in public health · 2026Article
- Perceived socioeconomic vulnerability, but not objective poverty, is linked to interoception through perceived stress.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
- Social mobility beliefs moderate links between SSS, attributions for wealth and poverty, and aggression.BMC psychology · 2025Article
- Association between Unmet Social Need and Ambulatory Quality of Care for US Children.Academic pediatrics · 2025Article
- Youth health behaviors and their reverse intergenerational impact.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Moderated moderation modelling of subjective social status, pocket money and depressive symptoms of university students in Ghana.Frontiers in public health · 2024Article
- Regional Socioeconomic Deprivation in Germany and Adherence to the 24-h Movement Guidelines among Children and Adolescents.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundSubjective "ladder" measurements of socio-economic status (SES) are easy-to-administer tools that ask respondents to rate their own SES, allowing them to evaluate their own material resources and determine where it places them relative to their community. Here, we sought to compare the MacArthur Scale of Subjective Social status to the WAMI, an objective measure of SES that includes data on water and sanitation, asset ownership, education, and income.
methodsLeveraging a study of 595 tuberculosis patients in Lima, Peru, we compared the MacArthur ladder score to the WAMI score using weighted Kappa scores and Spearman's rank correlation coefficient. We identified outliers that fell outside the 95
resultsThe correlation coefficient between the MacArthur ladder and WAMI scores was 0.37 and the weighted Kappa was 0.26. The correlation coefficients differed by less than 0.04 and the Kappa ranged from 0.26 to 0.34, indicating fair agreement. When we replaced the initial MacArthur ladder scores with retest scores, the number of individuals with disagreements between the two scores decreased from 21 to 10 and the correlation coefficient and weighted Kappa both increased by at least 0.03. Lastly, we found that when we categorized WAMI and MacArthur ladder scores into three groups, both had a linear trend association with history of asthma with effect sizes and AICs that differed by less than 15% and 2 points, respectively.
conclusionOur findings demonstrated fair agreement between the MacArthur ladder and WAMI scores. The agreement between the two SES measurements increased when they were further categorized into 3-5 categories, the form in which SES is often used in epidemiologic studies. The MacArthur score also performed similarly to WAMI in predicting a socio-economically sensitive health outcome. Researchers should consider subjective SES tools as an alternative method for measuring SES, particularly in large health studies where data collection is a burden.
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