The purpose of the study was to test the reliability and validity of the Korean version of Task Self-Efficacy Scale for activities of daily living(ADL). The Task Self-Efficacy Scale was developed by Roberts(1996) for low-intensity exercise study with older people to predict their performance of ADL. The scale was translated and back translated by bilingual persons, and then was modified to resolve variations in the translations. The Korean version of Self-efficacy Scale of ADL was then administered to 193 elderly people including 95 hospitalized patients and 98 outpatients or healthy people. Face to face interview was used to fill out the structured questionnaire, and each interview took approximately 30 minutes. The subjects for the study were 80 women and 112 men with an age range of 65 to 95 years(M=71 years) of whom 82.6% classified themselves as moderate or quite active. Most subjects(80.2%) had an education level of elementary school or less. The Self-Efficacy Scale for ADL is measured on a 0 to 10 VAS, assessing three areas of ADL : self care activities, household tasks, and motor tasks. The higher the score is the higher person's confidence in performing ADL. Psychometric testing revealed that the scale was found to be internally consistent, showing a Cronbach's alpha of .97. The scale was significantly correlated with subjects' level of activity and subjective assessment of their health status. Moderate correlation with health-related hardiness scale also supported the validity. Factor analysis was performed to confirm whether the scale represents the three sub-areas as suggested in the literature. The results of the factor analysis led to a three factor solution according to Kaiser's criterion, but the items were not strongly and cleanly loaded for the third factor. This can be explained in that, among the three sub-ADL ares of the self-efficacy scale, the areas of self care activities and household tasks seem to have similar levels of difficulty in performance with not enough differences for the self-efficacy scale to distinguish between the two areas. Therefore, one factor solution was suggested since ADL can be seen a unit of activities as similar level of difficulty in performance. One factor solution explained 68.1% of variance of the 19-item scale and all items all correlated over .6 with the factor, showing that the selected factor solution fits the model. The results indicated that the Korean version of Task Self-Efficacy Scale for ADL was reliable and valid in producing useful information to evaluate the effects of various interventions toward promoting health and quality of life for elderly people.

The purpose of the study was to identify the effects of 12-week low-intensity exercise program on muscle strength, flexibility, balance, and cognitive characteristics related to the performance of activity of daily living(ADL). A total of 16 patients who were admitted to the medical unit of a general hospital in ChoongChung province were recruited eight for the exercise group and eight for the comparison group. Four levels of low-intensity exercise from 'ROM on bed' to 'exercise while walking' were then applied to the exercise group according to their physical condition. During hospitalization, patients in the exercise group performed each level of the prescribed exercise with the researchers until they felt. comfortable doing it independently. The researchers also visited the patients' homes after discharge to make sure they could perform the exercise with Theraband in their living environment. The exercise group was contacted by phone once a week to assess the frequency and intensity in which they performed the exercise as well as their physical condition. The subjects in the comparison group participated in measurements for the study without performing the exercise and were contacted by phone after discharge, in a matched time frame with the exercise group, to assess physical condition. Muscle strength, flexibility, balance, cognitive characteristics, and performance of ADL for the two groups were compared at the pretest and the posttest after the low-intensity exercise program by utilizing SPSSWIN and the results are as follows : 1) At the posttest, measurments of muscle strengths showed that the strength of the dorsal flexor in the exercise group was significantly higher than in the comparison group. 2) Objective balance for the exercise group was significantly better than for the comparison group as measured by 'standing on one foot' and Tinetti gait and balance control. 3) The exercise group showed significantly higher task self-efficacy than the comparison group. 4) Perceived exertion for ADL for the exercise group was significantly lower than for the comparison group. 5) Improvement of performance of ADL without assistance was significantly for the exercise group than the comparison group. The findings suggest that a low-intensity exercise program would be useful for the elderly who show decline in their physical functioning due to hospitalization by partly improving physical strength, task self-efficacy, and performance of ADL. Directions for further research on issues of motivating people to exercise as well as of standardizing various types of exercise were discussed.