Survey development for assessing correlates of young adolescents' eating.
OBJECTIVE
To describe the development and psychometric testing of a survey to assess multiple influences on young adolescents' eating behaviors.


METHODS
A 204-item survey was piloted with middle-school students. We incorporated a broad view of determinants of eating behavior in an effort to expand the current field of predictors.


RESULTS
The survey was reduced to 147 items and administered to 3,878 students. Internal consistencies were generally >0.70. Test-retest reliabilities were 0.30-0.98, mostly >0.60.


CONCLUSIONS
We estimated psychometric properties for a range of measures in a diverse sample. This is important as the increasing demand for outcomes-based research expands the need for psychometrically sound survey measures.
Birnbaum
Amanda S
AS
Division of Epidemiology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis 55454-1054, USA. birnbaum@epi.umn.edu
Lytle
Leslie A
LA
Murray
David M
DM
Story
Mary
M
Perry
Cheryl L
CL
Boutelle
Kerri N
KN
D000293:Adolescent; D000294:Adolescent Behavior / Q000208:ethnology / Q000523:psychology*; D004435:Eating / Q000523:psychology*; D005247:Feeding Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D015438:Health Behavior / Q000208:ethnology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008910:Minnesota; D009749:Nutrition Surveys; D011594:Psychometrics; D012309:Risk-Taking; D012572:School Health Services; D013334:Students / Q000523:psychology*; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires