The Tamil Version of the Three-Factor Eating Questionnaire-R18V2: Reliability and Factor Structure Among Persons with Schizophrenia

G Swarnameenaa; Jothilakshmi Durairaj; Nithyashri Hariharan; Vaishnavi K Madhavan; Pavithra Arunachaleeswaran; Lakshmi Venkatraman; Anoop Sankaranarayanan; Padmavati Ramachandran

doi:10.1177/02537176231210401

The Tamil Version of the Three-Factor Eating Questionnaire-R18V2: Reliability and Factor Structure Among Persons with Schizophrenia

Indian J Psychol Med. 2024 Mar;46(2):125-130. doi: 10.1177/02537176231210401. Epub 2023 Dec 13.

Authors

G Swarnameenaa¹, Jothilakshmi Durairaj², Nithyashri Hariharan², Vaishnavi K Madhavan³, Pavithra Arunachaleeswaran², Lakshmi Venkatraman², Anoop Sankaranarayanan⁴, Padmavati Ramachandran²

Affiliations

¹ Dept. of Clinical Psychology, Central Institute of Psychiatry, Ranchi, Jharkhand, India.
² Dept. of Psychiatry, Schizophrenia Research Foundation, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India.
³ King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
⁴ Melaleuca Unit, Blacktown Hospital, WSLHD Mental Health Service, New South Wales, Australia.

Abstract

Background: Persons with schizophrenia (PwS) are vulnerable to developing disordered eating behaviors. However, standardized tools to assess disordered eating patterns are unavailable in the regional language, Tamil. Different versions of the Three-Factor Eating Questionnaire (TFEQ) have been used to measure disordered eating patterns among PwS worldwide. This study aimed to assess the factor structure and reliability of the Tamil version of TFEQ-R18V2 among Tamil-speaking PwS.

Methods: Over three months, 135 PwS, aged 18-65 years, who attended the outpatient department of a tertiary mental health service provider in Chennai, completed the Tamil version of TFEQ-R18V2. Thirty PwS completed the tool after two weeks to assess its test-retest reliability. The factor structure of the tool was explored using principal component analysis.

Results: The sample included 75 (55.6%) males and 60 (44.4%) females with a mean (±SD) age of 40.1 (±9.8) years and a mean duration of illness of 11.99 (± 8.72) years. Internal consistency and test-retest reliability of the Tamil version were 0.84 and 0.532, respectively. A five-factor structure emerged from the factor analysis, with 65.67% of the variance.

Conclusion: The Tamil version of TFEQ-R18V2 emerged as a reliable tool to assess disordered eating patterns among Tamil-speaking PwS.

Keywords: Disordered eating behaviors; Reliability; Schizophrenia; Translation; Validity.