# Validity and Reproducibility of an Electronic Food Frequency Questionnaire in Argentinian Adults

## TL;DR

This study validated an electronic food frequency questionnaire in Argentinian adults, finding it moderately accurate for estimating nutrient intake.

## Contribution

The study provides validation data for a new electronic dietary assessment tool tailored to Argentinian adults.

## Key findings

- The eFFQ showed moderate to good reproducibility for most nutrients with ICCs ranging from 0.29 to 0.85.
- Agreement within one quintile of exact agreement ranged from 52.2% to 74% for validity and 70.6% to 87.7% for reproducibility.
- The eFFQ slightly overestimates nutrient intake but is valid for ranking individuals' dietary habits.

## Abstract

This study aimed to validate a semiquantitative electronic food frequency questionnaire (eFFQ) in estimating the intake of a comprehensive list of nutrients and bioactive compounds among adults from six regions of Argentina using multiple 24 h dietary recall (24HR) as a reference. A total of 163 adults completed two administrations of the eFFQ and four 24HRs. The paired t-test/Wilcoxon signed-rank test, Spearman/Pearson correlations, cross-classification, weighted kappa statistics, and Bland–Altman plots were employed to determine relative validity. To determine reproducibility, intraclass correlations (ICC), cross-classification, and weighted kappa statistics were calculated. For relative validity, crude correlations ranged from 0.15 to 0.57; energy adjustment and de-attenuation slightly improved most of these correlations. In cross-classification analysis, agreements within one quintile adjacent to exact agreement (EA ± 1) ranged from 52.2% to ~74%; extreme misclassifications were < 7%. For reproducibility, the crude ICC ranged from 0.29 to 0.85, showing moderate to good correlations for most nutrients. Cross-classification analysis showed agreement levels for the EA ± 1 quintile of 70.6% to 87.7%. Weighted kappa values ranged from 0.21 to 0.62. The results show that this eFFQ is relatively valid in ranking adults according to their nutrient intake and has an acceptable reproducibility, yet it slightly overestimates the intake of most nutrients.