Attitudes Towards Food Allergy Scale: Psychometric properties and associations with food allergy quality of life and anxiety

• Published in: Clinical and translational allergy Vol. 12; no. 10; pp. e12205 - n/a
• Main Authors: Lins de Holanda Coelho, Gabriel, Pereira Monteiro, Renan, DunnGalvin, Audrey
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England John Wiley & Sons, Inc 01-10-2022; John Wiley and Sons Inc; Wiley
• Subjects: Anxiety; Attitudes; Coping; Food allergies; food allergy; Item response theory; measure development; Original; Parents & parenting; psychometrics; Quality of life; Quantitative psychology; United Kingdom > UK; psychometrics; measure development; quality of life; food allergy; attitudes
• ISSN: 2045-7022; 2045-7022
• DOI: 10.1002/clt2.12205

Background
Daily, we tend to evaluate things positively or negatively, according to whether they follow the general information available about them. This attitudinal assessment is represented through evaluative dimensions (e.g., good‐bad) that vary in terms of valence (positive or negative) and strength (less or more). Despite its importance, there is an urge in food allergy (FA) research to properly assess attitudes based on the underlying mechanisms that define attitudes.
Objective
The present research aimed to develop the Attitudes Towards Food Allergy scale (ATFAS), the first attitudinal measure of FA. Method: Two studies were performed (n = 1049), using a range of robust statistical analyses (e.g., Item Response Theory, Exploratory Factor Analysis, Confirmatory Factor Analysis).
Results
Our results provided strong evidence for a unidimensional attitudinal structure, across groups of non‐allergic individuals and food‐allergic, besides recommended reliability levels. All items presented suitable parameters (i.e., discrimination, difficulty, information). Finally, the ATFAS significantly predicted FA quality of life, mediated by FA anxiety.
Conclusion
We are confident that the ATFAS is a novel and necessary measure, that can help to widen how we view and assess FA. The development of studies that assess attitudes towards FA based on our general information about the disorder would help to deepen our understanding of their links to other health‐related variables and their potential impact on quality of life, reduce FA's stigma, and develop more positive attitudes.