Maxime Legendre1, Marilou Côté1, Annie Aimé2, Marie-Christine Brault3, Jacinthe Dion4, Catherine Bégin5. 1. School of Psychology, Pavillon Félix-Antoine-Savard, Laval University, 2325, rue des Bibliothèques, Quebec, QC, G1V 0A6, Canada. 2. Psychology and Psychoeducation Department, Pavillon Campus de Saint-Jérôme, Université du Québec en Outaouais, 5, rue St-Joseph, St-Jérôme, QC, J7Z 0B7, Canada. 3. Department of Human and Social Sciences, Université du Québec À Chicoutimi, 555, boul. de l'université, Chicoutimi, QC, G7H 2BI, Canada. 4. Department of Health Sciences, Université du Québec À Chicoutimi, 555, boul. de l'université, Chicoutimi, QC, G7H 2BI, Canada. 5. School of Psychology, Pavillon Félix-Antoine-Savard, Laval University, 2325, rue des Bibliothèques, Quebec, QC, G1V 0A6, Canada. catherine.begin@psy.ulaval.ca.
Abstract
PURPOSE: Disordered eating attitudes and behaviors (DEAB) in childhood have been prospectively associated with eating disorders and obesity in adolescence. Therefore, evaluating DEAB in children with a reliable, sensitive and well-adapted scale is very important. The Children's Eating Attitudes Test (ChEAT) is one of the most popular measuring tools for DEAB in children, but no French version is available. Moreover, while completion time is an important factor to be considered when working with children, only one recent study proposed a shorter version of the ChEAT. Taking the previous works of Murphy and colleagues (2019) as a starting point, the current study aimed to provide the first French-speaking validated 14-item short version of the ChEAT. METHODS: A sample of 1092 boys and girls aged between 8 and 12 years old were recruited in two urban areas in the province of Quebec, Canada. They completed the ChEAT, and their height and weight were measured at school. Factorial structure and internal consistency were assessed. RESULTS: After the initial factorial analysis, two "vomiting (or purging)" items were yielded as problematic and were thus removed from the analysis. The remaining 12 items provided a good fit to the data and a good internal consistency. Moreover, the factorial structure was proved to be invariant across sexes. CONCLUSION: This study is the first to provide a French assessment of DEAB in elementary school children. The French short version of the ChEAT provided a quick and reliable assessment for DEAB with non-clinical children population and could be used as a screening tool, even though no cut-off was established yet. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Cross-sectional, descriptive study, Level V.
PURPOSE: Disordered eating attitudes and behaviors (DEAB) in childhood have been prospectively associated with eating disorders and obesity in adolescence. Therefore, evaluating DEAB in children with a reliable, sensitive and well-adapted scale is very important. The Children's Eating Attitudes Test (ChEAT) is one of the most popular measuring tools for DEAB in children, but no French version is available. Moreover, while completion time is an important factor to be considered when working with children, only one recent study proposed a shorter version of the ChEAT. Taking the previous works of Murphy and colleagues (2019) as a starting point, the current study aimed to provide the first French-speaking validated 14-item short version of the ChEAT. METHODS: A sample of 1092 boys and girls aged between 8 and 12 years old were recruited in two urban areas in the province of Quebec, Canada. They completed the ChEAT, and their height and weight were measured at school. Factorial structure and internal consistency were assessed. RESULTS: After the initial factorial analysis, two "vomiting (or purging)" items were yielded as problematic and were thus removed from the analysis. The remaining 12 items provided a good fit to the data and a good internal consistency. Moreover, the factorial structure was proved to be invariant across sexes. CONCLUSION: This study is the first to provide a French assessment of DEAB in elementary school children. The French short version of the ChEAT provided a quick and reliable assessment for DEAB with non-clinical children population and could be used as a screening tool, even though no cut-off was established yet. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Cross-sectional, descriptive study, Level V.
Authors: Kaitlin H Wade; Michael S Kramer; Emily Oken; Nicholas J Timpson; Oleg Skugarevsky; Rita Patel; Natalia Bogdanovich; Konstantin Vilchuck; George Davey Smith; Jennifer Thompson; Richard M Martin Journal: Am J Clin Nutr Date: 2016-12-14 Impact factor: 7.045