Cross-cultural adaptation and evaluation of the psychometric properties of the Brazilian version of the Positive Eating Scale

Eating behavior is a subject of growing interest in nutrition, though studies still focus on its "negative" aspects, and limited attention has been paid to indicators of a positive relationship with food, which is positively related to beneficial health outcomes. The scope of this study was to execute and describe the process of cross-cultural adaptation of the Positive Eating Scale (PES), which is the only scale that assesses positive eating, into Brazilian Portuguese, in addition to evaluating its psychometric properties. The process encompassed stages of conceptual and item equivalence; semantic equivalence by three translators and 13 experts; operational equivalence, carried out with 153 individuals; and measurement equivalence, carried out with 588 young adults, by means of confirmatory factor analysis and reliability. The results indicate adequate conceptual equivalence of semantic and operational aspects. In the measurement equivalence stage, there was excellent factor adjustment (chi 2/df = 1.14; CFI = 1.00; TLI = 1.00; RM-SEA = 0.02 [CI90% = 0.00-0.04]; SRMR = 0.042) and good internal consistency (omega = 0.86). The results support the validity and reliability of the PES, which allows the scale to be applied to assess positive eating in the Brazilian context.