Reliability and Validity of Digital Images to Assess Child Dietary Intake in a Quick-Service Restaurant Setting

Abstract

Background: Development of methods to accurately measure dietary intake in free-living situations-restaurants or otherwise-is critically needed to understand overall dietary patterns.

Objective: This study aimed to develop and test reliability and validity of digital images (DI) for measuring children's dietary intake in quick-service restaurants (QSRs), validating against weighed plate waste (PW) and bomb calorimetry (BC).

Design: In 2016, cross-sectional data were collected at two time points within a randomized controlled trial assessing children's leftovers in QSRs from parents of 4- to 12-year-old children.

Participants/setting: Parents (n = 640; mean age = 35.9 y; 70.8% female) consented and agreed to provide their child's PW for digital imaging, across 11 QSRs in Massachusetts in areas with low socioeconomic status and ethnically diverse populations.

Outcome measures: Outcome measures were interrater reliability for DIs, correspondence between methods for energy consumed and left over, and correspondence between methods across varying quantities of PW.

Analyses performed: Intraclass correlations, percent agreement, Spearman correlations, Wilcoxon signed rank tests, and Bland-Altman plots were used.

Results: Interrater reliability ratings for DIs had substantial intraclass correlations (ICC = 0.94) but not acceptable exact percent agreement (80.2%); DI and PW energy consumed were significantly correlated (r = 0.96, P < 0.001); DI slightly underestimated energy consumed compared with PW (Mdiff = -1.61 kcals, P < 0.001). Bland-Altman plots showed high DI-PW correspondence across various energy amounts and revealed few outliers. Energy left over by BC was highly correlated with DI (r = 0.87, P < 0.001) and PW (r = 0.90, P < 0.001); and mean differences were not significantly different from DI (Mdiff = 9.77 kcal, P = 0.06) or PW (Mdiff = -2.84 kcal, P = 0.20).

Conclusions: Correspondence was high between PW and DI assessments of energy consumed, and high with BC energy left over. Results demonstrate reliability and practical validity of digital images for assessing child meal consumption in QSR settings.

Keywords: Child nutrition; Dietary assessment; Digital images; Quick-serve restaurant; Real-world.