Validation of a light questionnaire with real-life photopic illuminance measurements: the Harvard Light Exposure Assessment questionnaire

Details

• Personal Author:
  Bajaj A ; Lockley SW ; Rosner B ; Schernhammer ES
• Description:
  BACKGROUND: Shift work, which necessitates light exposure at night, is now considered a probable carcinogen. To study the effects of light on chronic diseases like cancer, methods to measure light exposure in large observational studies are needed. We aimed to investigate the validity of self-reported current light exposure. METHODS: We developed a self-administered semiquantitative light questionnaire, the Harvard Light Exposure Assessment (H-LEA) questionnaire, and compared photopic scores derived from this questionnaire with actual photopic and circadian measures obtained from a real-life 7-day light meter application among 132 women (85 rotating night shift workers and 47 day workers) participating in the Nurses' Health Study II. RESULTS: After adjustment for age, body mass index (BMI), collection day, and night work status, the overall partial Spearman correlation between self-report of light exposure and actual photopic light measurements was 0.72 (P < 0.001; Kendall t = 0.57) and 0.73 (P < 0.0001; Kendall t = 0.58) when correlating circadian light measurements. There were only minimal differences in accuracy of self-report of light exposure and photopic or "circadian" light measurement between day (r = 0.77 and 0.78, respectively) and rotating night shift workers (r = 0.68 and 0.69, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: The results of this study provide evidence of the criterion validity of self-reported light exposure using the H-LEA questionnaire. IMPACT: This questionnaire is a practical method of assessing light exposure in large-scale epidemiologic studies [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Eye Lighting Men Occupational Health Safety Sense Organs Shift Work Schedule Surveys And Questionnaires Women
• Keywords:
  Humans Lighting-systems Optical-aids Physiological-factors Questionnaires Shift-work Shift-workers Workers
• ISSN:
  1055-9965
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Grant
• Genre:
  Journal Article
• Place as Subject:
  Illinois ; Massachusetts ; Ohio ; OSHA Region 1 ; OSHA Region 5
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Volume:
  20
• Issue:
  7
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20039935
• Citation:
  Cancer Epidemiol Biomark Prev 2011 Jul; 20(7):1341-1349
• Contact Point Address:
  Eva S. Schernhammer, Channing Laboratory, 181 Longwood Avenue, Boston, MA 02115
• Email:
  eva.schernhammer@channing.harvard.edu
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2011
• NORA Priority Area:
  Manufacturing
• Performing Organization:
  University of Illinois at Chicago
• Peer Reviewed:
  True
• Start Date:
  20010701
• Source Full Name:
  Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention
• End Date:
  20150831
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:85f273971d068cbb5581409e2258537ce07202169eb03c0908bf06fcb7f3f5227c547cadfa511f961fcf26846096b0616e9e48716f94c8571912a7ab674adcd8
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/192978/cdc_192978_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 481.08 KB ]