The purpose of this study was to develop a group-administered needs assessment device in the area of food purchasing for upper elementary students. Food purchasing concepts were identified as the basis for developing the device. These concepts were product quality, food labeling, and shopping techniques. Specific behaviors were determined for each concept and these behaviors were depicted in 29 black and white pictures. Students selected one of three options to indicate their typical behavor and wrote a reason for the choice of option;Content validity was established by nutrition specialists. A total of 998 fifth and sixth grade students from 21 schools in nine states responded to the survey. Data were randomly divided into two groups by grade. A hierarchical format was used to code the data from group one. Group two data were coded by the alphabetical option selected;Group one data were subjected to factor analysis using the iterated principal axis factor solution. Two- through four-factor solutions were subjected to Varimax rotation; the one-factor solution was not rotated as factor loadings were already determined. Inspection of the four solutions showed that the device was measuring one general concept. Therefore, the one-factor solution was accepted. Additional support for the one-factor solution was shown by the item-total score correlations as 27 items met the condition of additivity;Reliabilities were .82 for fifth and .83 for sixth grade; reliabilities were calculated using the Kuder-Richardson #20 procedure. Discrimination and difficulty criterion was met by 17 items in both grades and two items in one grade. No revisions were suggested as these items assess important content;Comparison of the two methods of scoring showed that the hierarchical method resulted in a device that was more difficult and discriminated better between high and low scores. This method also provides more information on why the student selected each option.