[Attitude to eating and body weight by 11- to 16-year-old adolescents].

Based on the data of 966 students grade five to eight, a new questionnaire--the "Eating Behaviour and Weight Problems Inventory for Children (EWI-C)"--was developed. Its 60 items are assigned to 10 subscales measuring: (1) hunger level and susceptibility to food cues, (2) importance and impact of eating on sense of well-being, (3) eating as a means of coping with emotional stress, (4) concerns about eating and weight, (5) dietary restraint, (6) attitude toward healthful nutrition, (7) attitude toward the obese, (8) pressures to eat from parents, (9) fear of weight gain, (10) figure dissatisfaction. Neither children's age nor father's educational level were related to their subscale scores to a significant degree. However, on all scales (except scale 3) important gender differences could be observed. From the youngest age groups on, mean values of girls clearly exceeded those of boys on scales 4, 5, 9 and 10, while on scales 1, 2, 7 and 8 mean scores of girls were significantly lower. To analyse relationships between EWI scores and children's relative weight, 620 students' data were combined with those of 445 adolescents attending weight-reduction programs in two obesity clinics. Boys' and girls' individual deviations from mean weight per height were used to form six groups ranging from underweight to severe obesity. In both sexes mean scores on scales 3-5, 9 and 10 significantly increased with increasing (over) weight, while a (partial) decrease could be observed on scales 2 and 8. Scores of subscales 1 and 7 proved to be independent of children's relative weight. Based on the data of the combined sample (n = 1065), norm tables with percentile ranks are provided which allow for children's sex and weight. By means of these tables the position of a boy's or girl's subscale score can be evaluated in relation to his/her weight category (underweight, normal weight, obesity, severe obesity). A child's responses on the EWI-C can be analysed by a DOS-program which is available on diskette.