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Validity and Internal Consistency of the Preschool-FLAT, a New Tool for the Assessment of Food Literacy in Young Children from the Training-To-Health Project

Background: The importance of assessing “food literacy” since youth has been highlighted and, to this purpose, valid and consistent instruments are needed. This study aimed to assess the validity and internal consistency of the preschool-FLAT (Food Literacy Assessment Tool). Methods. 505 children fr...

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Autores principales: Tabacchi, Garden, Battaglia, Giuseppe, Messina, Giuseppe, Paoli, Antonio, Palma, Antonio, Bellafiore, Marianna
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7215692/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32316251
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17082759
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author Tabacchi, Garden
Battaglia, Giuseppe
Messina, Giuseppe
Paoli, Antonio
Palma, Antonio
Bellafiore, Marianna
author_facet Tabacchi, Garden
Battaglia, Giuseppe
Messina, Giuseppe
Paoli, Antonio
Palma, Antonio
Bellafiore, Marianna
author_sort Tabacchi, Garden
collection PubMed
description Background: The importance of assessing “food literacy” since youth has been highlighted and, to this purpose, valid and consistent instruments are needed. This study aimed to assess the validity and internal consistency of the preschool-FLAT (Food Literacy Assessment Tool). Methods. 505 children from 21 kindergartens, recruited within the Training-to-Health Project in Palermo (Italy), underwent oral sessions and activities on food-related aspects. Their knowledge/skills were recorded in the preschool-FLAT. The following scale measures were assessed: Content validity; internal consistency (Chronbach’s alpha coefficients); construct validity (Structural Equation Modeling—SEM); discriminant validity (intervention subgroup of 100 children vs. control group of 27 children). Results. Acceptable content validity of a 16-items scale and overall adequate internal consistency were revealed: Content validity index (CVI) 0.94, content validity ratio (CVR) 0.88, Chronbach’s alpha 0.76. The SEM revealed a 4-factor model fitting the data well (comparative fit index 0.939, root mean square error of approximation 0.033). Discriminant validity was good (intervention group scoring higher than control, p < 0.001, unpaired Student’s t-test). Conclusion. The preschool-FLAT revealed good psychometric properties, adequate validity and internal consistency. This is the only instrument in the literature specifically targeted to 3–6 years old children that could be effectively used to assess food literacy.
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spelling pubmed-72156922020-05-22 Validity and Internal Consistency of the Preschool-FLAT, a New Tool for the Assessment of Food Literacy in Young Children from the Training-To-Health Project Tabacchi, Garden Battaglia, Giuseppe Messina, Giuseppe Paoli, Antonio Palma, Antonio Bellafiore, Marianna Int J Environ Res Public Health Article Background: The importance of assessing “food literacy” since youth has been highlighted and, to this purpose, valid and consistent instruments are needed. This study aimed to assess the validity and internal consistency of the preschool-FLAT (Food Literacy Assessment Tool). Methods. 505 children from 21 kindergartens, recruited within the Training-to-Health Project in Palermo (Italy), underwent oral sessions and activities on food-related aspects. Their knowledge/skills were recorded in the preschool-FLAT. The following scale measures were assessed: Content validity; internal consistency (Chronbach’s alpha coefficients); construct validity (Structural Equation Modeling—SEM); discriminant validity (intervention subgroup of 100 children vs. control group of 27 children). Results. Acceptable content validity of a 16-items scale and overall adequate internal consistency were revealed: Content validity index (CVI) 0.94, content validity ratio (CVR) 0.88, Chronbach’s alpha 0.76. The SEM revealed a 4-factor model fitting the data well (comparative fit index 0.939, root mean square error of approximation 0.033). Discriminant validity was good (intervention group scoring higher than control, p < 0.001, unpaired Student’s t-test). Conclusion. The preschool-FLAT revealed good psychometric properties, adequate validity and internal consistency. This is the only instrument in the literature specifically targeted to 3–6 years old children that could be effectively used to assess food literacy. MDPI 2020-04-16 2020-04 /pmc/articles/PMC7215692/ /pubmed/32316251 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17082759 Text en © 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Tabacchi, Garden
Battaglia, Giuseppe
Messina, Giuseppe
Paoli, Antonio
Palma, Antonio
Bellafiore, Marianna
Validity and Internal Consistency of the Preschool-FLAT, a New Tool for the Assessment of Food Literacy in Young Children from the Training-To-Health Project
title Validity and Internal Consistency of the Preschool-FLAT, a New Tool for the Assessment of Food Literacy in Young Children from the Training-To-Health Project
title_full Validity and Internal Consistency of the Preschool-FLAT, a New Tool for the Assessment of Food Literacy in Young Children from the Training-To-Health Project
title_fullStr Validity and Internal Consistency of the Preschool-FLAT, a New Tool for the Assessment of Food Literacy in Young Children from the Training-To-Health Project
title_full_unstemmed Validity and Internal Consistency of the Preschool-FLAT, a New Tool for the Assessment of Food Literacy in Young Children from the Training-To-Health Project
title_short Validity and Internal Consistency of the Preschool-FLAT, a New Tool for the Assessment of Food Literacy in Young Children from the Training-To-Health Project
title_sort validity and internal consistency of the preschool-flat, a new tool for the assessment of food literacy in young children from the training-to-health project
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7215692/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32316251
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17082759
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