Background/Purpose Physical educators are now being called upon to teach nutrition concepts as a way to complement existing nutrition education curriculum as part of a comprehensive school health education curriculum (Wallen & Davis, 2010). The purpose of this study was to develop and validate an instrument that measures pre-service physical education teachers' nutrition knowledge, attitudes toward the integration of nutrition into the physical education curriculum, and self-efficacy of teaching nutrition concepts.
Method The NKASI was constructed based on a literature review, consultation of content from experts, and Bandura's (2006) self-efficacy theory. The instrument was administered to 50 undergraduate university students. Reliability of the test/questionnaire was determined by internal consistency using Cronbach's alpha. Exploratory factor analysis was performed to assess questionnaire validity. Item analysis was used to estimate validity of items for knowledge test.
Analysis/Results Exploratory factor analysis revealed 3 factors: F1, Self-efficacy of teaching nutrition; F2, Importance of nutrition education; and F3, outcome expectations. Questionnaire items loading .50 or higher were retained, with the exception of one item factoring .488. Cronbachs' alpha measured internal consistency for each subscale: F1 (.975), F2 (.810), F3 (.800). Item difficulty ranged from .14 to .96. Items that fell below .30 or above 8.0 and had a low discrimination were eliminated, with the exception of one item that was deemed important. Index of discrimination ranged from -.029 to .736.
Conclusions The NKASI is a valid and reliable instrument that can be used to measure pre-service physical educators' nutrition knowledge, attitudes toward nutrition education, and self-efficacy of teaching nutrition concepts.