Fat phobia scale revisited: the short form

OBJECTIVE: To develop a shortened form of the original 50-item fat phobia s cale. METHOD: The first factor from the original fat phobia scale-undisciplined, inactive and unappealing-was identified as a potential short form of the sc ale. A new sample of 255 people completed the original 50-item scale. The r eliability of a shortened 14-item version of the scale was tested and compa red to that of the full scale using both the new sample and the original sa mple of 1135 study participants. RESULTS: The fat phobia scale - short form demonstrated excellent reliabili ty in both samples and was strongly correlated with the 50-item scale. Mean and 90th percentile scores are given for both the long and short versions of the scale. CONCLUSION: The shortened fat phobia scale is expected to increase the util ity of the measure in a diverse array of research and clinical settings. Fu ture research should focus on developing scale norms for the general popula tion and conducting research on fat phobia in males and among different eth nic groups.