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Home › Diagnosing Anxiety & Other Mental Health Conditions › Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale

Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale

If you would like a copy of your answers and results emailed to you, please provide your email address here:
Obsessions are unwelcome and distressing ideas, thoughts, or impulses that repeatedly enter your mind. They may seem to occur against your will. They may be repugnant to you, you may recognize them as senseless, and they may not fit your personality.

Examples: recurrent thought or impulses to do harm to a child even though you never would, the idea that household cleansers may lead to contamination and serious illness 

Obsessions differ from worries in that worries are about possible negative things related to life problems that you are afraid might happen. For example, you may worry about failing an exam, about finances, health, or personal relationships. In contrast to obsessions, your worries don’t usually seem totally senseless, repugnant, or inconsistent with your personality.

Please think about your obsessions when answering the first 5 questions. Select the answer that best describes you over the last 7 days (including today).
How much of your time is occupied by obsessive thoughts? How frequently do these thoughts occur?
How much do your obsessive thoughts interfere with your personal, social or work functioning?
How much distress do your obsessive thoughts cause you?
How much effort do you make to resist the obsessive thought? How often do you try to disregard or turn your attention away from those thoughts as they enter your mind?
How much control do you have over your obsessive thoughts? How successful are you in stopping or diverting your obsessive thinking?
Please select any obsessions you are currently experiencing or have experienced in the past.
Aggressive Obsessions
Contamination Obsessions
Somatic Obsessions
Sexual Obsessions
Hoarding/Saving ObsessionsThis is different from hobbies and concern with objects of monetary or sentimental value.
Religious Obsessions (Scrupulosity)
Obsession with Need for Symmetry or Exactness
Miscellaneous Obsessions
Other ObsessionsPlease describe any obsessions for which you indicated "Other" above.
Compulsions are behaviors or acts that you feel driven to perform although you may recognize them as senseless or excessive. Usually compulsions are performed in response to an obsession, or according to certain rules or in a stereotyped fashion. At times, you may try to resist doing them but this may prove difficult. You may experience discomfort that does not diminish until the behavior is completed.

Examples: the need to repeatedly check appliances, water faucets, and the lock on the front door before you can leave the house, repeated handwashing, silent checking or having to recite nonsense phrases to yourself each time you have a bad thought

Compulsions, as we define them here, are not to be confused with other kinds of compulsive behavior such as overeating, gambling, drinking alcohol, overshopping, or other “addictive behaviors.”

Please think about your compulsions when answering the last 5 questions. Select the answer that best describes you over the last 7 days (including today).
How much time do you spend performing compulsive behaviors? How frequently do you perform compulsions?
How much do your compulsive behaviors interfere with your personal, social or work functioning?
How would you feel if prevented from performing your compulsion(s)? How anxious would you become?
How much effort do you make to resist the compulsion(s)?
How much control do you have over the compulsion(s)? How successful were you in stopping the ritual(s)?
Cleaning/Washing Compulsions
Checking Compulsions
Repeating Rituals
Counting Compulsions
Ordering/Arranging Compulsions
Hoarding/Collecting CompulsionsThis is different from hobbies and concern with objects of monetary or sentimental value.

Examples: carefully reading junk mail, piling up old newspapers, sorting through garbage, collecting useless objects
Miscellaneous Compulsions
Other CompulsionsPlease describe any compulsions for which you indicated "Other" above.
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