An evaluation of a colour food photography atlas as a tool for quantifying food portion size in epidemiological dietary surveys

Abstract

Objective: To test the validity of a colour food photography atlas for quantifying portion size eaten compared with weighed foods. Design: The colour food photography atlas was prepared by cooking, weighing and taking digital photographs of three portion sizes of 434 foods and beverages typical of the Italian diet. Subjects and interventions: In all, 448 male and female volunteers aged 6-60 y from a wide variety of social backgrounds completed 9075 assessments of food portions eaten at lunch and dinner in relation to a set of colour food photographs during 8 weeks of investigation. The amounts of foods eaten by individuals in five different cafeterias in Pavia, Northern Italy, were weighed by trained investigators at the time of serving and, within 5-10 min of the end of the meal, each subject was asked to quantify all foods consumed with reference to one of the three food photographs or in terms of virtual portions among those shown in the photographs.Results: Multiple regression analysis shows that weights of portion sizes chosen from the set of photographs are significantly associated (Po0.05) to weights of eaten portions (b ¼ 0.81; R 2 ¼ 0.70) and are independent of age, gender and BMI. The differences between mean weights of the portions chosen by individuals from photographs and mean weights of eaten foods are significant for all food categories (Po0.05), except for bread. However, because of the very large number of observations, the mean differences are very small (range: from þ 23.2 g ( þ 11.2%) for first courses to À1.3 g (À2.7%) for bread). Bland-Altman plots show that first courses limits of agreement are wide because the dispersion is increasing while weights are rising. Conclusions: The use of a series of three photographs and virtual portion sizes being associated with relatively small errors, our findings support the validity of using this colour food photography atlas as a tool for quantifying food portion size in epidemiological dietary surveys on different age groups of Italian subjects.

Correlational study and randomised controlled trial for understanding and changing red meat consumption: The role of eating identities

“…The online food diary required participants to select items for each food eaten at breakfast, lunchtime and dinner plus any snacks consumed. All food items were associated with photographs of three portion sizes of foods typical of the Italian diet (Turconi et al, 2005). For the analyses, only items which referred to red meat were selected.…”

Evaluation of photographs supporting an FFQ developed for adolescents

“…Turconi et al (23) assessed the validity of food photographs in the estimation of food intake by children, adolescents and adults and also observed that there were no statistically significant differences in the identification of portion size in food photographs according to sex, age Cream of wheat 77 64 87 Beans 77 64 87 Lasagne 75 63 85 Cream cheese 75 63 85 Ground meat 74 62 84 Grated carrot 74 62 84 Fish 74 62 84 Yam 69 56 80 Watercress 68 55 79 Margarine 67 53 78 Pudding 66 53 77 Guava jam 63 50 75 Liver 61 47 74 Beef stew with vegetables 60 46 72 Chicken 52 38 65 Pineapple 47 34 61 Porridge 43 31 57 Chocolate powder 40 28 53 Tomato 29 18 43 *Polenta is a typical Brazilian dish made of cornmeal boiled in water with salt.…”

Estimated portion sizes in a school-aged population

“…In our study we used food photographs that were originally developed for use in adults (15,16) and have been demonstrated to be useful in estimating portion sizes in adult populations. A number of studies have shown that children can use food photographs to adequately describe food portion sizes (17,18) . Foster et al (19) showed that children reporting portion sizes using adult food photographs overestimated their intake compared with using age-appropriate tools being developed by researchers.…”