To understand the relevance of the fear of fatness construct across culture and gender, we translated the Goldfarb Fear of FatScale (GFFS) and examined its psychometric properties in English and Spanish languages in a sample of Euro-American male (n= 111) and female (n= 100), and Spanish male (n= 114) and female (n= 544) college students in the United States and Spain. Confirmatory and exploratory analyses tested the measurement equivalence of the instrument across samples by gender and culture. Eight of the 10 items appeared to demonstrate measurement invariance. Mean comparisons on the eight-item version suggested that there was a gender by country interaction, with Euro-American women scoring substantially higher than the three other groups. Overall, these results highlight the need for additional examinations of cross-cultural instrument invariance and explorations of the fear of fatness construct.

Ambwani, Suman, Cortney S. Warren, David H. Gleaves, Antonio Cepeda-Bonito, and Mari Carmen Fernandez. Culture, Gender, and Assessment of Fear of Fatness. European Journal of Psychological Assessment 24, no. 2 (2008): 81-87. https://econtent.hogrefe.com/doi/epdf/10.1027/1015-5759.24.2.81

Suman Ambwani is a professor of Psychology at Dickinson College.

For more information on the published version visit Hogrefe's Website. https://econtent.hogrefe.com/doi/epdf/10.1027/1015-5759.24.2.81

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