Reliability of the Block Kid's Food Frequency Questionnaire translated to Arabic and adapted for Kuwaiti children

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

10-2021

Department

Department of Cognitive and Learning Sciences

Abstract

Objectives

Little is known about the nutrient intakes of Kuwaiti children; this is partly due to a lack of culture-specific dietary assessment instruments to estimate the usual food and nutrient intake of Arab children. The aim of this study was to describe the methodology used in translating the 2004 Block Kid's Food Frequency Questionnaire (Block FFQ) to Arabic using adapted food choices commonly consumed by Kuwaiti children, and to evaluate the reliability of the FFQ in a population of fifth-grade Kuwaiti children.

Methods

The 2004 Block FFQ was translated from English to Arabic, and food options were replaced with culturally appropriate foods. The modified FFQ was administered to 367 male and female Kuwaiti fifth graders (10.4 ± 0.4 y of age; 53% girls). The FFQ was retested 1 wk later in 26 male students, and 4 wk later in 32 female students. Intraclass correlations (ICC) assessed the reliability between the participants’ first and second FFQs for food groups, macronutrients, and five key micronutrients.

Results

The combined analysis of boys and girls indicated a moderate reliability for food groups (ICC, 0.68; 95% confidence interval [CI]; 0.52–0.80) and micronutrients (ICC, 0.54; 95% CI, 0.29–0.72), but was poor for macronutrients (ICC, 0.43; 95% CI, 0.21–0.62).

Conclusions

The modified FFQ is a modestly reliable instrument for measuring usual dietary intake in Kuwaiti children. The ICC was higher in boys than in girls, probably due to the disparity in the FFQ retest time.

Publication Title

Nutrition

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