Validity of a Dietary Questionnaire Assessed by Comparison With Multiple Weighed Dietary Records or 24-Hour Recalls

Abstract

The authors evaluated the validity of a 152-item semiquantitative food frequency questionnaire (SFFQ) by comparing it with two 7-day dietary records (7DDRs) or up to 4 automated self-administered 24-hour recalls (ASA24s) over a 1-year period in the women's Lifestyle Validation Study (2010-2012), conducted among subgroups of the Nurses' Health Studies. Intakes of energy and 44 nutrients were assessed using the 3 methods among 632 US women. Compared with the 7DDRs, SFFQ responses tended to underestimate sodium intake but overestimate intakes of energy, macronutrients, and several nutrients in fruits and vegetables, such as carotenoids. Spearman correlation coefficients between energy-adjusted intakes from 7DDRs and the SFFQ completed at the end of the data-collection period ranged from 0.36 for lauric acid to 0.77 for alcohol (mean r = 0.53). Correlations of the end-period SFFQ were weaker when ASA24s were used as the comparison method (mean r = 0.43). After adjustment for within-person variation in the comparison method, the correlations of the final SFFQ were similar with 7DDRs (mean r = 0.63) and ASA24s (mean r = 0.62). These data indicate that this SFFQ provided reasonably valid estimates for intakes of a wide variety of dietary variables and that use of multiple 24-hour recalls or 7DDRs as a comparison method provided similar conclusions if day-to-day variation was taken into account.

Long term gluten consumption in adults without celiac disease and risk of coronary heart disease: prospective cohort study

“…Although gluten has not been specifically quantified in validation studies of food frequency questionnaires, this instrument has shown good validity with regard to reasonable correlation with seven day dietary recall of foods containing gluten (supplementary table A) and intake of vegetable protein, to which gluten is a significant contributor. 29 In addition, participants with undiagnosed celiac disease were not uniformly identified in these cohorts. However, according to population based estimates, such people would account for less than 1% of the cohort.…”

“…27 28 A separate validation study of this food frequency questionnaire found that this method of measuring vegetable (that is, plant based) protein intake, of which gluten is the major contributor, correlated highly with that measured in seven day dietary records (Spearman correlation coefficient 0.66). 29 We divided cohort participants into fifths of estimated gluten consumption, according to energy adjusted grams of gluten per day. We obtained energy adjusted values by regression using the residual method, as described previously.…”

Co-occurrence of behavioral risk factors for chronic non-communicable diseases in adolescents: Prevalence and associated factors

“…This strategy aimed at minimizing errors of interpretation and response. It is also worth noting that the use of a FFQ, as a method to assess food consumption, tends to overestimate the reported consumption [43]. However, this tendency of overestimating makes the presence of a risk factor even more evident among those who were classified as having a non-regular consumption of fruits and vegetables, which is considered a marker of a healthy diet.…”

Magnesium Intake, Quality of Carbohydrates, and Risk of Type 2 Diabetes: Results From Three U.S. Cohorts

“…All foods and nutrients were energy adjusted using the residual method (20). The validity and reliability of the FFQs have been previously described (21–24). Previous validation studies in subsets of participants have shown that FFQ-derived estimates of energy-adjusted intakes of magnesium, fiber, and total carbohydrate are moderately to strongly correlated with diet record–derived reports (magnesium, r = 0.61–0.73; fiber, r = 0.63–0.68; total carbohydrate, r = 0.65–0.73) (22,24).…”