Development and validation of a weight-related eating questionnaire

The objective of this study was to develop an improved weight-related eating questionnaire (WREQ) that reflects recent advancements in the assessment and understanding of theory-based eating behaviors. A sequential process of measurement development was used to construct this brief but comprehensive questionnaire. By factor analysis and structural equation modeling, a 16-item, four-factor structure was found to best fit the data. This newly developed questionnaire measures two constructs of dietary restraint (routine and compensatory restraint), susceptibility to external cues (external eating), and emotional eating. The WREQ demonstrated good preliminary construct validation against similar psychometrics, BMI, and measures of fruit and vegetable and dietary fat intake. Further validation analyses, particularly against other energy intake measures, are justified. Successful development and preliminary validation of this updated weight-related eating behavior questionnaire provides support for the WREQ as an improvement over existing eating behavior measures and warrants its use in future research.