A new measurement tool to assess the deliberate overfeeding of others: The Feeder questionnaire.

Abstract

Whilst overeating is often influenced by others in an implicit way, people may also explicitly encourage others to overeat. This has been labelled being "a Feeder" but to date, this more deliberate trait remains neglected. This study aimed to conceptualize being "a Feeder" in terms of motivations and behaviour and to operationalize this construct with a new measurement tool through five stages with three discrete samples. Using the definition of a Feeder as "someone who offers others food even when they are not hungry" a preliminary qualitative study (n = 5) clarified the behaviour of a Feeder and revealed six motivations for such feeder behaviour. These six motivational dimensions and the feeder behaviours were operationalized with individual items and the psychometric properties of the scale were assessed using two independent samples (n = 116; n = 113). The final 27-item measure consisted of six motivational factors (affection; waste avoidance; status; hunger avoidance; offloading; manners) and one behaviour factor, all with good internal consistency (α ≥ .7). The two samples were then merged (n = 229) to describe motivations and behaviour and to assess the association between them. The best predictors of feeder behaviour were love, offloading, manners and status. This new Feeder questionnaire has a strong factor structure and good internal consistency and could be used for further research or clinical practice.