Arabic REAP-S validation gives clinicians a brief dietary screen in young adults
A new psychometric study has translated, culturally adapted, and tested the Arabic version of the Rapid Eating Assessment for Participants-Shortened Version (REAP-S), giving Arabic-speaking clinicians and researchers a concise instrument for dietary screening. The work focused on young adults in Saudi universities, a population where eating patterns often shift under academic pressure, irregular schedules, and changing food environments. In a setting where diet quality can deteriorate quietly long before chronic disease appears, a short and culturally appropriate questionnaire can make routine screening more realistic.
The study recruited 500 undergraduate and postgraduate nursing students from Saudi universities during the 2025-2026 academic year, with 490 included in the final psychometric analyses. The median age was 20 years, and 54.1% of participants were female. Those details matter because questionnaire validation is never abstract; the performance of a dietary tool depends on whether real respondents interpret each item as intended, answer across the full response range, and do so consistently enough for clinical use.
One factor structure held up under two separate analytic approaches.
Factor structure held across confirmatory and Rasch testing
Investigators used a standardized forward-backward translation process followed by cross-cultural adaptation steps before asking participants to complete the Arabic REAP-S through an online self-administered questionnaire. Construct validity was assessed with confirmatory factor analysis, and item-level behavior was examined with Rasch Measurement Theory. Using both approaches is important because they answer different questions: confirmatory factor analysis tests whether the scale behaves like a single coherent construct, while Rasch analysis checks whether each item contributes appropriately to measurement across the trait being assessed.
The confirmatory factor analysis supported the hypothesized one-factor model. Fit indices were strong by common psychometric standards: CFI 0.984, TLI 0.978, RMSEA 0.076, and SRMR 0.061. Standardized factor loadings ranged from 0.429 to 0.768, suggesting that the items contributed unequally but acceptably to the overall construct. In practical terms, the scale did not fracture into separate domains or behave like a mismatched set of questions. It performed as a brief measure of dietary behavior rather than a loose checklist.
Rasch analysis reinforced that interpretation. The scale showed unidimensionality, acceptable person-item targeting, and ordered response thresholds, meaning the response options functioned in a logical progression rather than collapsing into confusion or redundancy. All items demonstrated acceptable infit and outfit mean square statistics, with infit ranging from 0.826 to 1.311 and outfit from 0.866 to 1.283. For clinicians and researchers, those numbers suggest the items neither misfired wildly nor became too predictable to contribute meaningful information.
Reliability stayed solid in a young adult sample
Internal consistency was good, with Cronbach’s alpha at 0.863. Rasch-based reliability estimates were also favorable, with person reliability measured by Expected A Posteriori at 0.872 and Weighted Likelihood Estimate at 0.848. Those values indicate that the Arabic REAP-S separated participants along the dietary behavior continuum with reasonable precision.
The instrument discriminated between different levels of dietary behavior among Arabic-speaking young adults.
This is the practical value of a short screen. In busy student health settings, nursing education programs, or community outreach clinics, a long dietary questionnaire often fails because time, attention, and workflow get in the way. A shorter validated tool can be deployed more realistically, especially where the goal is not a full dietary inventory but a rapid identification of people who may need further assessment, counseling, or referral. When a scale is brief and psychometrically sound, screening can happen before diet-related risk hardens into metabolic disease.
Why cultural adaptation matters for dietary screening
Dietary assessment tools are particularly vulnerable to translation errors because food habits, meal timing, preparation methods, and social eating norms vary across populations. A literal translation can preserve wording while losing meaning. The forward-backward translation process used here, combined with cultural adaptation, was designed to prevent exactly that problem. The result is not simply an Arabic-language version of an English questionnaire; it is a measure shaped for Arabic-speaking respondents whose food choices and dietary routines may not map neatly onto the assumptions built into the original instrument.
The study’s focus on nursing students also fits the broader public health logic of early prevention. Young adults may appear healthy on the surface while already showing patterns that support excess sodium intake, low fruit and vegetable consumption, irregular meals, or other behaviors linked to future cardiometabolic risk. A screening tool like the Arabic REAP-S does not diagnose disease. It helps identify dietary patterns that warrant attention before disease emerges.
What the preprint can and cannot claim
This is a preprint and has not undergone peer review, so its psychometric findings should be read as promising rather than definitive. The sample came from university nursing students, which offers a useful test population but not the full spectrum of Arabic-speaking adults across age, education, occupation, and health status. The study design was cross-sectional, so it supports validity and reliability at one point in time but does not show how the tool performs longitudinally or across clinical populations.
Still, the core message is straightforward: the Arabic REAP-S appears to be a brief, valid, and reliable measure for assessing dietary behaviors in Arabic-speaking young adults. In settings where nutrition screening is often constrained by time and staffing, a well-adapted questionnaire can do useful clinical work. The next hurdle is broader testing beyond a student sample, especially in community and primary care populations where dietary risk is more diverse and the consequences of missed screening are harder to ignore.