An Italian-Australian comparison of quality of life among people with intellectual disability living in the community

This paper reports the measurement of both objective and subjective quality of life in samples of people either with intellectual disability or from the general adult population, drawn from Australia and Italy. Measures were made using the Comprehensive Quality of Life Scale. Generally, it was found that the scores for all groups were comparable. This finding is consistent with the provision of generally decent objective living conditions in both countries and subjective well-being homeostasis, wherein subjective quality of life is held within a predictable range. These results are discussed in the context of measurement difficulties imposed by the need for simple Likert scales and subjective data which are strongly negatively skewed.