Multifactor Screener in the 2000 NHIS Cancer Control Supplement (CCS)
The Multifactor Screener may be useful to assess approximate intakes of fruits and
vegetables, percentage energy from fat, and fiber. The screener asks respondents to report
how frequently they consume foods in 16 categories. The screener also asks one question
about the type of milk consumed. No portion size questions are asked. This screener does
not attempt to assess total diet.
The foods selected to compose the screener were identified through an analysis of
USDA's 1994-96 Continuing Survey of Food Intakes of Individuals (CSFII), a nationally
representative survey of the food intakes of the US population available from the USDA's Food Surveys Research Group.
NCI's Risk Factor Monitoring and Methods
Branch staff used stepwise regression to identify the food groups that would best
predict the three dietary exposures. Some of the foods in the screener predict all three
exposures; some predict only one or two of the exposures.
The questions for the Multifactor Screener are provided below in two formats:
self-report and in-person interviewer-administered.
In NHIS 2000, we applied rules for excluding extreme data responses, described in Definition of Acceptable Dietary Data. The process of scoring
the individual response data is described in Scoring
Procedures. A description and guidelines for the appropriate uses of the
screener-estimated dietary intakes is found in Uses of Screener
Estimates. Validation data for the NHIS 2001 screener are presented in Validity Results. Finally, the various dietary intake variables
are found in Computed Variables.
NOTE: The dietary variables on the NHIS 2000 dataset are in their natural units. For
analyses, however, they must be transformed, first, to approximate normal distributions.
For servings of fruits and vegetables, use the square root transformation; for fiber, use
the cube-root transformation. No transformation is necessary for percent energy from fat.
After analyses, the result variables can be back-transformed for easier
interpretation.
A new Dietary Screener is in the 2005 NHIS.
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