Journal Article

Developing two Food Literacy Measures for Public Health Application

Balakrishnan, Sharmini, Perry, Elsie Azevedo, Manowiec, Ella, Valleau, Lucy, Holmes, Martin, Davids, Rebecca, Edmonstone, Shannon, Kirkpatrick, Sharon, McGibbon, Kim, Kennedy, Lauren, Samra, H Ruby, Thomas, Heather

2024

Overview

Background: Recognizing the complexity of food systems and the critical role of diet in non-communicable diseases, there is increased interest in exploring food literacy as a determinant of dietary practice. However, a common conceptualization and a standardized measure is lacking. Ontario public health dietitians developed a 50-question and a shortened, 16-question food literacy (FLit) measure for use with adolescents and young adults. These measures can provide an evidence-informed approach for population surveillance and to inform, implement, and evaluate policies and programs to support healthy eating. Aim: The aim is to share how the two measures of food literacy can be used in public health practice and research. Summary: Employing an integrated knowledge transition approach, the team of dietitians partnered with researchers to conceptualize food literacy and develop a comprehensive measure. This work included a scoping review and Delphi study to develop a novel conceptualization, incorporating multiple domains thought to comprise food literacy and questions reflecting these domains. Researchers with experience in measurement development contributed to the refinement of the questions, and evaluated the measure with the target population for cognitive validity, test-retcst reliability, factor analysis, construct validity, and questionlevel analysis. The result of these efforts was a 50-item and a 16-item measure. The longer measure provides a food literacy score and information for practitioners across the domains useful for program design or education efforts, whereas the shorter screening measure is appropriate for scoring food literacy. Discussion: With the food landscape undergoing continual change, understanding the influence of food literacy on dietary behaviors is essential. The FLit50 and FLit16 instruments are valuable for population monitoring and guiding the creation and assessment of interventions and policies related to food literacy. Future research will assess these measures' relevance to different age groups and their link to dietary quality.

• Publisher: Dietitians of Canada
• Subject: Adolescents / Dietitians / Eating behavior / Evaluation / Factor analysis / Food / Food quality / Literacy / Policies / Population studies / Public health / Questions / Young adults