Self-rated health (SRH) and subjective life expectancy (SLE) are widely used for understanding health and predicting mortality. However, what these items measure remains unclear, due to the lack of conceptual frameworks. We administered a web survey across the United States, Great Britain, Germany, Spain, and Mexico. The questionnaire included SRH and SLE, each immediately followed by a question that probed respondents’ thought processes. We examined the relationship between SRH and SLE, the response difficulty, and attributes that respondents considered for forming responses. Overall, SRH and SLE were moderately related, eliciting different information and varying in difficulty. Compared to SLE, SRH was perceived as easier but covered a narrower information spectrum. While illness and health behaviors were dominant attributes of SRH responses, family longevity history, life situations, and lack of control were additionally considered for SLE. When combined, SRH and SLE may capture a fuller range of attributes germane to health and mortality.

中文翻译：

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通过网络探测探索自我评估健康和主观预期寿命背后的心理模型

自评健康 (SRH) 和主观预期寿命 (SLE) 被广泛用于了解健康和预测死亡率。然而，由于缺乏概念框架，这些项目的衡量标准仍不清楚。我们在美国、英国、德国、西班牙和墨西哥进行了一项网络调查。调查问卷包括 SRH 和 SLE，每一个紧跟其后的问题是探究受访者的思维过程。我们检查了 SRH 和 SLE 之间的关系、响应难度以及受访者在形成响应时考虑的属性。总体而言，SRH 和 SLE 是中等相关的，引出不同的信息和不同的难度。与 SLE 相比，SRH 被认为更容易，但涵盖的信息范围更窄。虽然疾病和健康行为是 SRH 反应的主要属性，SLE 还考虑了家族长寿史、生活状况和缺乏控制。结合起来，SRH 和 SLE 可能会捕捉到与健康和死亡率密切相关的更全面的属性。