RESPONSE BIASES IN FIELD STUDIES OF MENTAL ILLNESS.

This paper is concerned with the question of response biases in field studies of menial illness. Following a discussion of the possible influence of two response biases which may affect the validity of social science measures-social desirability and acquiescence-the results of a pilot study concerning a psychiatric inventory used by several investigators are presented. Analysis of data from this study reveals that people's evaluation as to the "social desirability" of the inventory items is related both to their position in the status hierarchy and to their reports as to whether or not they have experienced the various symptoms constituting the psychiatric inventory. Thus, the relationship between socioeconomic position and mental health is affected by people's evaluations as to the desirability of mental health inventory items. However, the findings also confirm that the existence of a relationship between socioeconomic position and disorder is not just a result of the hypothesized distortions arising from a response bias. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]