Family Quality of Life Scale

The Beach Center Family Quality of Life Scale (FQOL) measures quality of life at the level of the family unit rather than the individual, designed especially for families that include a member with a disability. Developed at the University of Kansas Beach Center on Disability by Lesa Hoffman, Janet Marquis, Denise Poston, Jean Ann Summers and Ann Turnbull, and psychometrically evaluated in 2006, the scale asks family members to rate their satisfaction across five domains: family interaction, parenting, emotional well-being, physical and material well-being, and disability-related support. Its central move is treating the family, not the person, as the unit whose quality of life is assessed, reflecting a disability-studies and family-systems view that support and outcomes are collective.