[Psychometric validation of the International FItness Scale (IFIS) in Colombian youth].

BACKGROUND

The International Fitness Scale (IFIS a 5-item version) to assess physical activity levels in the European population was created as part of the framework of the EU-funded project HELENA Study "Healthy Lifestyle in Europe by Nutrition in Adolescence". The objective of this study was to evaluate the test-retest stability, internal consistency, proportion of agreement and applicability to Colombian young adults.

METHODS

A total of 2.340 individuals (1.376 female and 964 male; age 18-30 years) Colombian completed the questionnaire IFIS. Intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC) and proportion of agreement were computed to assess the stability of the two test scores, with a period of 7 days between the two administrations. Cronbach alpha were calculated to assess the internal consistency of each scale and proportion of agreement was also calculated to measure the proportion of occasions that individuals gave the same score.

RESULTS

The Cronbach alpha coefficient is 0.80. The reliability scores of the IFIS were excellent (ICC range 0.90-0.96). The proportion of agreement for all individual items ranged from 77-86%. Mean (±SD) time for questionnaire completion during the assessment was 3 minutes 47 seconds (±2 min).

CONCLUSION

It appears to have high reliability and reproducibility. The questionnaire is now available to other researchers to investigate its usefulness and applicability across Latin American.