The Measurement and Methods Core (Core D) of the Native Elder Research Center (NERC) is broadly focused to accommodate the diverse research portfolio of the NERC and the Native Investigators (NIs) participating in the Investigator Development Core. The Core has 2 major responsibilities. The first is to identify, assess, and develop measurement tools and methodologies to capture and analyze the effects of ethnocultural variability on the health of the older American Indian/Alaska Native (AI/AN) population. The second is to support the NIs in the: 1) conduct of their secondary data analysis projects;2) development and implementation of their pilot studies and 3) crafting of their research grant applications. This Core links a social science perspective on operationalizing key ethnocultural constructs with epidemiological and biostatistical tools of data analysis. An overarching principle is to expose the NIs to measurement tools and methods that are valid and reliable in distinct cultural contexts, especially as they pertain to health disparities. Jack Goldberg, Ph.D., Research Professor of Epidemiology leads the Measurement and Methods Core. Dr. Goldberg is a senior methodologist with more than 20 years of professional experience in the design and conduct of observational and experimental studies. For the past decade he has worked closely with Dr. Spero M. Manson, the Principal Investigator and Director, NERC, on studies involving AI/AN populations.
The specific aims of this Core are to: 1) enhance strategies for assessing cultural variability in measures and to better understand the impact of culture on health disparities;2) assess the performance of measurement tools across different ethnocultural settings for consistency, reliability and validity;3) provide training and mentoring to the NIs in the application of methodologies to specific research questions;4) develop and critically evaluate a catalogue of data sets containing information on the health of AI/ANs that can used by NIs;and 5) develop methodologies that emphasize scientific rigor by attending to issues of study design, execution and data analysis. The Measurement and Methods Core supports Nl secondary analysis and primary data collection pilot projects that are grounded in a dynamic multi-level conceptual framework of health disparities. The NERC links closely with the pre-existing Research and Methodological Core of the National Center for American Indian and Alaska Native Mental Health Research (NCAIANMHR;see Administrative Core). This synergy with a large well-established program provides added depth to the NERC, particularly in the area of psychometric and qualitative methodologies. By providing crucially needed expertise in measurement, study design, and methodology, it also plays an integral role in the Nl Cor
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