Assessing Older Adults’ Masticatory Efficiency

Objectives To determine internal consistency and criterion validity of a questionnaire assessing perception of masticatory efficiency in community‐dwelling older adults. Design Secondary cross‐sectional analysis of baseline data from the Q uébec L ongitudinal S tudy on N utrition and S uccessful A ging ( N u A ge). Setting N u A ge is a 5‐year (2003–08) observational study of 1,793 men and women aged 67 to 84 in good general health at recruitment. Participants A sample of 1,789 was used to determine internal consistency of the questionnaire. A subsample (n = 94) of the cohort who underwent a clinical test directly measuring masticatory efficiency was used to determine criterion validity of the questionnaire. Measurements The questionnaire was a subset of the O ral H ealth I mpact P rofile containing 7 Likert‐scale questions (score 0–28 points). Masticatory efficiency was assessed using a validated clinical test measuring ability to chew a raw carrot ( S wallowing T hreshold T est I ndex, score 0–100%). For perceived and measured data, a higher score indicated better masticatory efficiency. Results Internal consistency of the questionnaire was deemed good ( C ronbach alpha = 0.803). Mean scores were generally high (men, 25.3, 95% confidence interval ( CI ) = 24.7–25.9; women, 24.3, 95% CI  = 23.7–25.0), indicating good perceived masticatory efficiency for men and women. Mean performance test scores were low (men, 60.8%, 95% CI  = 57.3–64.2; women, 61.2%, 95% CI  = 57.7–64.7). No significant relationship between perceived and measured masticatory efficiency was observed ( P earson correlation coefficient = −0.14, P  = .22). Conclusion Despite good internal consistency of the questionnaire and the recognized validity of the test, people's perception of their masticatory efficiency does not reflect objective efficiency as measured using a clinical test.