Food noise refers to persistent and intrusive thoughts about food that may interfere with daily functioning, emotional well-being, and eating behaviors. Although the construct has gained increasing attention in clinical and research contexts, no psychometrically sound tools are currently available in Italian to assess food noise. Therefore, the present study aimed to translate, adapt, and evaluate the psychometric properties of the Italian version of the Food Noise Questionnaire (FNQ). A total of 1087 participants (mean age 37.45 ± 10.35 years; 50.6% female) were enrolled in the investigation. Participants completed the Italian version of the FNQ, along with a convergent measure of food-related preoccupation and self-report measures of depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms, and perceived stress. Confirmatory factor analysis supported a unidimensional factor structure for the FNQ, with salient standardized factor loadings (range = 0.803–0.919) and strong internal-consistency reliability (categorical ω = 0.917). Evidence of convergent validity was provided by strong associations with food-related preoccupation (r = 0.831, p < 0.001), whereas discriminant validity was supported by smaller, yet significant, correlations with anxiety, depression, and perceived stress (r range = 0.350 to 0.417, p < 0.001). In addition, configural, metric, and scalar invariance across gender was established within a multi-group framework. These findings provide evidence for the FNQ as a reliable and valid measure of food noise in the Italian adult population, demonstrating robust psychometric properties and gender-invariant measurement.
Mocini et al. (Mon,) studied this question.