(P02-014-25) Understanding Knowledge, Attitudes, and Motivations Related to Food Waste Among Adolescents

Objectives: Adolescents are key stakeholders in reducing food waste to promote a sustainable food system. Understanding the reasons why food is discarded and tracking changes in food waste knowledge, attitudes, and motivations of adolescents may provide key insight to future interventions. This study aims to assess the content and face validity of a food waste knowledge, attitudes, and motivations questionnaire for adolescents.

Methods: To determine whether the questionnaire captured the necessary concepts, an expert panel assessed content validity. Food waste and youth food systems experts provided feedback via email. Then, the questionnaire was revised based on expert suggestions. For the face validity phase, four adolescents ages of 13-17 were recruited via a community member to participate in cognitive interviews. In each phase, experts or adolescents commented on the questions’ appropriateness for adolescents, wording, comprehensiveness of food waste topics, repetitiveness of content, and missing themes.

Results: Based on feedback from a panel of seven food systems and youth program planning experts, item response options were changed and some items were reworded for clarity. All attitudes and motivation items were switched to Likert scales to capture more nuance. Questions were also added, taken out, or revised. For example, questions with the word “composting”  were updated to “composting food” to address confusion over material composted. For evaluation of face validity, the questionnaire was revised after the initial interview and then again after each subsequent interview until no further changes were recommended. Wording was altered to be more inclusive of ideas presented in interviews and more descriptive. For example, questions that referenced the participant’s parents were changed to “people I live with.”

Conclusions: The questionnaire was found to have adequate content and face validity. After further testing of validity and reliability, this tool can be used to inform and assess educational programs and public health policies. This questionnaire is the first developed to assess motivation, knowledge, and attitudes of adolescents related to food waste in the US.

Funding Sources: USDA; San José State University Department of Nutrition, Food Science, and Packaging; Circle of Friends