Development and evaluation of an Internet test on nutritional science: the nutrition IQ

The nutritional 10 measures the many facets of nutritional knowledge and integrates both questions from old questionnaire instruments and highly current issues. The evaluation algorithm was developed on the basis of a representative survey of the German population from 14 years of age. The classification was analogous to the well known intelligence quotients, which makes the results easier to understand. The questionnaire is available free of charge in the Internet (www.ernaehrungs-iq.de), so that it can be used by wide sections of the population, including both nutrition professionals and consumers. Further studies are needed to establish how nutritional knowledge is distributed within the German population, how it is correlated with other variables (such as schooling, age and residence) and whether there are observable changes over time.