Validation of the Dutch Eating Behavior Questionnaire for Children (DEBQ-C) for use with Spanish children

• Published in: Nutrición hospitalaria : organo oficial de la Sociedad Española de Nutrición Parenteral y Enteral Vol. 26; no. 4; pp. 890 - 898
• Main Authors: Baños, R M, Cebolla, A, Etchemendy, E, Felipe, S, Rasal, P, Botella, C
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English; Portuguese
• Published: Spain Grupo Arán 01.07.2011
• Subjects: Age Factors; Analysis of Variance; Attitude; Body Mass Index; Body Weight - physiology; Child; Factor Analysis, Statistical; Feeding and Eating Disorders - diagnosis; Feeding and Eating Disorders - psychology; Feeding Behavior - physiology; Female; Humans; Language; Male; Nutrition & Dietetics; Overweight - epidemiology; Overweight - psychology; Reproducibility of Results; Surveys and Questionnaires; Translations; Obesidad; Obesity; Feeding behavior; Conducta infantil; Conducta de ingesta; Eating disorders; Psicometría; Psychometrics; Child behavior; Trastornos de la conducta alimentaria
• ISSN: 1699-5198; 1699-5198
• DOI: 10.1590/S0212-16112011000400032

The Dutch Eating Behaviour Questionnaire for children was developed by Van Strien and Oosterveld (2008) to measure three different eating behaviors (emotional eating, restrained eating and external eating); it is an adaptation of the DEBQ for adults. The purpose of this study is to analyze the psychometric properties of the Dutch Eating Behavior Questionnaire for Children (DEBQ-C) with a Spanish sample. The DEBQ-C was administered to 473 children (240 boys and 233 girls), from 10 to 14 years old. The sample included a Clinical Overweight Group (COG; n = 81) comprising children who were receiving weight loss treatments, a Non Clinical Overweight Group (NCOG, n = 31) comprising children who were overweight but not in treatment, and a Normal Weight Group (NWG, n = 280). Results showed that the DEBQ-C had acceptable internal consistency (a = 0.70). Temporal stability was good for "External Eating" and "Restrained Eating" scales. Confirmatory factor analysis showed that the three-factor solution had good fit indices. Furthermore, the clinical overweight participants scored significantly higher on "External Eating" and "Restrained Eating" compared to the normal weight children. The DEBQ-C proved to be an effective instrument for researching children's eating behaviors.