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Self-rated health, or self-reported health (SRH), is a measure of a respondent's subjective sense of health. The SRH is commonly used to capture a general sense of health from the perspective of the respondent, which is assessed by one simple global question about their overall health. There are many phrasings of this question, including “In general, would you say your health is …,” “How would you rate your overall health …,” and “How is your health, compared with others your age?” Response items for these questions are Likert-type scales with responses typically scored from 1–5 (excellent, good, fair, poor, very bad) or 1–3 (better, same, worse). Methodologically, the SRH has been found to be both a reliable and valid measure of a respondent's health status ( Krause & Jay 1994 ; Lundberg & Manderbacka 1996 ; Miilunpalo et al. 1997 ). The SRH question is purposely and ambiguously constructed to not specify what is meant by health. While most people tend to think of “health” as physical health, some respondents may use a frame of reference that includes emotional or mental well-being. Some researchers place the SRH question at the beginning of a questionnaire so that respondents will not be influenced by later questions. Other investigators, who favor a broad definition of health, deliberately place the SRH at the end of their questionnaire so that responses can be informed ... log in or subscribe to read full text