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About feeding children: factor structure and internal reliability of a survey to assess mealtime strategies and beliefs of early childhood education teachers

Overview of attention for article published in International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, September 2018
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  • Good Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age (67th percentile)

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1 policy source
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Title
About feeding children: factor structure and internal reliability of a survey to assess mealtime strategies and beliefs of early childhood education teachers
Published in
International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, September 2018
DOI 10.1186/s12966-018-0717-x
Pubmed ID
Authors

Taren Swindle, Madeleine Sigman-Grant, Laurel J. Branen, Janice Fletcher, Susan L. Johnson

Abstract

Children spend a substantial amount of time in early care and education (ECE) settings and may eat a majority of their diet in this setting. While there are several instruments focused on measuring factors of the ECE environment that may influence diet and weight outcomes, there are few comprehensive, valid, and reliable measures for collecting self-report of ECE providers' feeding practices. The purpose of this study was to establish the factor structure and internal reliability of a survey developed to measure practices and beliefs of ECE providers relative to feeding children. Licensed ECE centers from CA, CO, ID and NV were included in this cross-sectional survey study. The sample was stratified by states and census regions to yield equal numbers of centers from each category. The total sample distribution included 1600 randomly selected centers and up to 8000 staff members (who represented teachers, aides, assistants, or cooks); 1178 surveys were completed. We conducted an exploratory, unrestricted factor analysis as well as parallel analyses to inform the number of factors to be extracted. Factors within Structural Mealtime Strategies included Adult Control of Foods Consumed (Kuder-Richardson [KR] = 0.67), Bribing with Sweet Foods (KR = 0.70), and Supportive Adult Roles at Mealtime (KR = 0.55). Factors in Verbal Mealtime Strategies included Supporting Children's Eating Self-regulation (KR =0.61), Pressure to Eat (KR = 0.58), and Social Comparisons (KR = 0.59). Beliefs about Mealtime factors were Autonomy Promoting (α = 0.64), Coercive Beliefs (α = 0.77), and Concern-Based Control (α = 0.60). The AFC Strategies and Beliefs Survey provides a promising self-report instrument with a strong factor structure consistent with the extant literature to measure practices and beliefs related to feeding and mealtimes in the ECE setting. Feeding young children in group settings differs in many ways from feeding in a family setting; hence it is important that measures such as the AFC Strategies and Beliefs Survey capture unique aspects of the ECE feeding environment.

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Mendeley readers

Mendeley readers

The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 118 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.

Geographical breakdown

Country Count As %
Unknown 118 100%

Demographic breakdown

Readers by professional status Count As %
Student > Bachelor 18 15%
Student > Master 15 13%
Researcher 12 10%
Student > Ph. D. Student 12 10%
Other 7 6%
Other 17 14%
Unknown 37 31%
Readers by discipline Count As %
Nursing and Health Professions 23 19%
Medicine and Dentistry 15 13%
Psychology 11 9%
Social Sciences 9 8%
Sports and Recreations 5 4%
Other 7 6%
Unknown 48 41%
Attention Score in Context

Attention Score in Context

This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 5. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 22 December 2020.
All research outputs
#6,136,631
of 23,103,436 outputs
Outputs from International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity
#1,444
of 1,945 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#107,850
of 337,287 outputs
Outputs of similar age from International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity
#32
of 32 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 23,103,436 research outputs across all sources so far. This one has received more attention than most of these and is in the 73rd percentile.
So far Altmetric has tracked 1,945 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a lot more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 28.8. This one is in the 25th percentile – i.e., 25% of its peers scored the same or lower than it.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 337,287 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one has gotten more attention than average, scoring higher than 67% of its contemporaries.
We're also able to compare this research output to 32 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one is in the 1st percentile – i.e., 1% of its contemporaries scored the same or lower than it.