DESIGNING AND PRETESTING A SERVICE SATISFACTION QUESTIONNAIRE FOR ELDERLY HOME-BASED CARE IN CHINA: AN INSTRUMENT DEVELOPMENT PROTOCOL

Abstract

Structural equation modeling of elderly-care satisfaction depends on a measurement instrument that is both psychometrically sound and usable by respondents who may have limited literacy, reduced stamina for long interviews, and unfamiliarity with abstract rating tasks. This paper sets out the design principles, structural logic, and pretesting protocol for a service-satisfaction questionnaire built around an integrated Structure-Process-Outcome and Customer-Satisfaction-Index (SERV-SPO-CSI) framework, intended for use with elderly recipients of home-based, community, and institutional care in China. The paper describes the questionnaire's four-module structure, the item-generation and simplification procedures applied to make it accessible to older respondents, and the planned pilot-testing and psychometric-refinement criteria — reliability screening by Cronbach's alpha and exploratory factor analysis — that will be used to finalize the instrument before full-scale data collection.