Curtin University

Development and Psychometric Evaluation of a Scale for Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder

Researchers at Curtin University are aiming to develop a brief and psychometrically valid measure of ARFID symptomatology, and are seeking to test this survey in a community sample of those self-reporting eating challenges.

We aim to test our survey in community sample of individuals with eating disorders. Of these individuals, we plan to recruit both those with and without self-reported diagnoses of ARFID. A diverse sample with a broad spectrum of symptoms is desirable for this purpose. Prevalence of ARFID is low (1-15%; Sanchez-Cerezo et al., 2023), so we have leveraged networks at Centre of Clinical Intervention, Orygen institute, and others (e.g., Butterfly Foundation) to promote the survey to individuals who experiencing more severe symptoms, supplemented by social media and word of mouth/snowballing.

ARFID is an eating disorder which is characterised by an avoidance or restriction of certain types of foods because of an aversion to specific features of the food (e.g., taste, smell, shape, colour), specific fears related to eating (e.g., choking, vomiting), or a disinterest in eating. This can lead to severe malnutrition and other related adverse physical and psychological outcomes associated with avoidant/restrictive behaviours (Kambanis et al., 2019; Nitsch et al., 2023; Ramirez & Gunturu, 2024; Robison et al., 2022; Zickgraf et al., 2016). However, current assessment processes cannot easily distinguish ARFID from other eating disorders, which can delay diagnosis and complicate treatment. We have aimed to develop a brief and psychometrically valid measure of ARFID symptomatology in response to calls for the needs described and are now seeking to test this survey in a community sample of those self-reporting eating challenges. We plan to use exploratory factor analysis to determine the factor-structure of the scale, identify redundant items, and assess internal reliability of the final scale and its factors. Construct validity will be assessed by comparing responses on the new measure to those with and without self-reported ARFID diagnosis. Sensitivity and specificity will be assessed to determine the optimal cut-off point for scale scores. We hope this project will result in a brief, psychometrically sound measure of ARFID symptomatology, suitable for screening, and research purposes. Availability of such a scale will help accelerate research and ultimately benefit those experiencing ARFID, by allowing for a more accurate and inclusive method for screening and tracking symptomatology.