Development of a reliable Dosha self-assessment questionnaire

Area of Science:

• Ayurvedic medicine
• Clinical research methodology
• Psychometrics

Background:

• The Ayurvedic theory of Tri-Dosha provides a framework for understanding individual health variations.
• Existing methods for Dosha assessment lack standardization and open-source reliability for clinical studies.
• Quantifying Doshas is crucial for controlling individual differences in research.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate a reliable, open-source self-assessment questionnaire for the three Ayurvedic Doshas (Vata, Pitta, Kapha).
• To create a tool suitable for use in clinical research to standardize individual assessments.
• To establish a psychometrically sound instrument for measuring Ayurvedic constitution.

Main Methods:

• Literature review of existing questionnaires and Ayurvedic texts.
• Generation of 108 Dosha-specific items based on analysis of 735 responses.
• Item selection using correlation analyses on a sample of 176 individuals.
• Validation of a 39-item questionnaire through test-retest reliability assessment (ICC 2,1) in 76 adults.

Main Results:

• The final 39-item questionnaire yields normally distributed results.
• Test-retest reliabilities for Vata, Pitta, and Kapha Dosha scores were all above 0.8.
• The developed questionnaire demonstrates adequate reliability for clinical applications.

Conclusions:

• It is feasible to reliably quantify the three Ayurvedic Doshas using a self-assessment questionnaire.
• The validated tool can be utilized in clinical studies to control for individual Dosha variations.
• This research contributes a reliable instrument for integrating Ayurvedic principles into modern scientific research.