Abstract
The Irrational Food Beliefs Scale (IFBS) is a self-report questionnaire comprising 57 items, 41 of which in the irrational food beliefs subscale, assessing cognitive distortions and inappropriate attitudes and beliefs about food. This study aimed to propose the Italian version of the IFBS and examine its psychometric properties. The tool was translated into Italian and administered to 503 Italian-speaking patients with obesity and 45 healthy controls. The clinical group also completed the Eating Disorder Examination (EDE) interview, and the Symptom Checklist-90 (SCL-90). Principal factor analysis identified that 51.6% of the variance was accounted for by six factors, which we termed ‘self-deception on eating and weight control’, ‘beliefs about eating and emotion regulation’, ‘low tolerance for eating control’, ‘beliefs about eating and hedonic pleasure’, ‘beliefs about dieting’, and ‘all-or-nothing thinking about eating.‘ The IFBS global and subscale scores were partially correlated with eating-disorder and general psychopathology. Significantly higher scores were found in patients with obesity and binge-eating disorder than in those with obesity without binge-eating disorder. Overall, the study demonstrated the good psychometric properties of the Italian version of the IFBS and validated its use in Italian-speaking patients with obesity.
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Data Availability
The datasets generated during and/or analysed during the current study are not available for public consultation, due the fact that they constitute an excerpt of research in progress. However, they are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Materials preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by Laura Dametti, Elena Bani, Chiara Tomasi, Anna Dalle Grave, Rossella Derrigo and Mirko Chimini. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Simona Calugi and Riccardo Dalle Grave, and all authors’ comments were taken into account in the final version, which was read and approved by all authors.
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The protocol was approved by the Verona and Rovigo Ethics Committee (project identification code 8571). The study was performed in accordance with the ethical standards laid down in the 1964 Declaration of Helsinki and its later amendments, or comparable ethical standards.
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Dametti, L., Bani, E., Tomasi, C. et al. The Irrational Food Beliefs Scale: Validation of the Italian Version in Patients with Obesity. J Rat-Emo Cognitive-Behav Ther (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10942-023-00499-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10942-023-00499-x