Gender related item response patterns for household food security scales in Brazil and Colombia

Abstract

Variations in gender related item response rates were explored using two similar locally adapted household food security scales used in the Colombian National Nutrition Survey 2005 (ENSIN; n=17,714) and the Brazilian National Household Survey 2004 (PNAD; n=101,155). Rasch Modeling was used to evaluate infit and measurement values separately for adult and children items by gender of the respondent. Adult and child related items presented good fitness, performing equally on both male and female response patterns. Both female and male respondents presented similar measurement values for adult and children items in the two countries. For most items, infit values were found to be within adequate range (0.8–1.2), being practically identical when comparing female and male responses. In addition, the frequency of affirmative response to each of the items followed the same pattern independently of the gender of the respondent. The results of this study support the validity of the two proposed scales indicating their suitability to measure household food insecurity in Brazil and Colombia.