Abstract
The Household Water Insecurity Experiences (HWISE) and Individual Water Insecurity Experiences (IWISE) Scales are globally suitable tools for comparably measuring water insecurity experiences among households and adults, respectively. The potential range for HWISE and IWISE scores is 0–36. When the WISE Scales were first published, scores of 12 and higher were considered indicative of water insecurity, but additional cut-points are needed to provide more nuanced insights. We therefore sought to develop a practical set of cut-points for the WISE Scales using HWISE data from 13 sites across 12 countries (n ¼ 3,293) and nationally representative samples of IWISE data from 38 countries collected by the Gallup World Poll (n ¼ 52,343). We selected cut-points in water insecurity scores to establish four ordinal cat-egories: no-to-marginal (0–2), low (3–11), moderate (12–23), and high (24–36) water insecurity. These categories were monotonically associated with increasing odds of reporting water dissatisfaction and helped to differentiate the breadth of water insecurity across popu-lations with heterogenous water insecurity experiences and frequencies. These four water insecurity categories can be used to better understand how water insecurity may be related to livelihoods, health, and well-being, both at low and high water insecurity.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 1066-1078 |
| Number of pages | 13 |
| Journal | Journal of Water Sanitation and Hygiene for Development |
| Volume | 14 |
| Issue number | 11 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Nov 1 2024 |
Funding
Data collection was funded by a Competitive Research Grant to Develop Innovative Methods and Metrics for Agriculture and Nutrition Actions (IMMANA). IMMANA is led by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and cofunded by UK Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), grant number 300654 and by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation INV-002962/OPP1211308. The project was also supported by the Carnegie Corporation, the Institute for Policy Research, the Buffett Institute for Global Studies, and the Center for Water Research at Northwestern University; National Institutes of Health (NIH/NIMH K01 MH098902 and R21 MH108444); the Office of the Vice Provost for Research of the University of Miami; Lloyd\u2019s Register Foundation for Labuan Bajo; and College of Health and Human Development and Social Science Research Institute at Pennsylvania State University. The Household Water Insecurity Experiences Research Coordination Network (HWISE-RCN) is supported by National Science Foundation (NSF) #BCS-1759972. SLY was supported by a Leverhulme Trust Visiting Professorship.
Keywords
- indicators
- scale development
- validation
- water security
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Development
- Water Science and Technology
- Waste Management and Disposal
- Pollution
- Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health
