Establishment of MOS-SF36 percentile ranks in the general youth French population

BACKGROUND: The SF-36 is a generic quality of life questionnaire, massively translated and widely used to obtain physical and mental health status. However, validation work in the French language was carried out over a generation ago. The objective of this study was to obtain the norms of the SF-36 in the French young population. METHOD: The sample consisted of 958 non-pre-screened French people aged between 18 and 24 years. RESULTS: The internal consistencies of the scales were high and the metrics associated with the factor structure were satisfactory. In general, women presented significantly higher scores than men. CONCLUSION: Our results suggest that the SF-36 remains a reliable tool for studying quality of life in the young French population.