Reliability and validity of a brief self-report measure of health-related fitness in adults: the Multidimensional Health-Related Fitness Scale.

BACKGROUND

Health-related fitness (HRF) is essential for wellbeing and daily functioning. While objective fitness assessments are preferred, self-report measures are practical for large-scale or geographically diverse studies. Existing self-report HRF measures may lack sensitivity for younger or healthy adults. Additionally, many include items with no or poorly defined reference populations, potentially limiting their validity and comparability. This study examined the reliability and validity of single-item self-reported HRF measures of aerobic fitness, muscular strength and endurance, flexibility, coordination, agility, and body composition.

METHODS

Between April and July 2023, University of Calgary students and staff (N.=129; mean age 28±9 years) completed the first questionnaire, with subsets completing a second questionnaire and validated fitness assessment. Nine items captured participants' self-rated HRF relative to those of the same age and gender. The nine self-reported HRF items were aggregated to obtain an estimate of overall HRF (Multidimensional Health-Related Fitness Scale, MHFS). We used intraclass correlations (ICC) to estimate test-retest reliability of the individual self-reported HRF items and MHFS. We assessed convergent validity with self-reported leisure physical activity (LPA) and concurrent validity with objective fitness measures using age- and sex-adjusted partial correlations.

RESULTS

The single-item self-reported HRF measures (ICC=0.60-0.85) and MHFS (ICC=0.87) had acceptable test-retest reliability. The MHFS also had high internal consistency (Cronbach's α=0.87). Evidence of validity was observed with partial correlations ≥0.30 between self-reported HRF and LPA, and objective fitness measures.

CONCLUSIONS

The MHFS provides a reliable and valid HRF indicator among younger adult populations.