Where ADHD Hits, and How You Scaffold It
Some people with ADHD look like they are managing. Deadlines get met, the job holds, nothing visibly falls over. What that picture leaves out is the cost: the lists, the alarms, the double-checking, the mental overhead of holding a life together by hand. This assessment runs two questionnaires clinicians use. The Weiss Functional Impairment Rating Scale (WFIRS-S) measures how much daily life is actually being affected, area by area. The Compensatory ADHD Behaviors Scale (CABS) records the executive function strategies you already use, and whether they help. Both are reported in full, scored by their own published rules, with the interpreting left to you and your doctor.
A questionnaire, not a diagnosis. Built by an ICF PCC-credentialled ADHD coach, not a clinician. It administers two published questionnaires in full and unaltered, scores them by their own published rules, and does not interpret them diagnostically. Your answers stay in your browser and are never sent to us.
Why Symptoms Alone Are Not the Whole Picture
Most self-assessments measure symptoms and stop there. Two people with the same symptom score can be living very different lives, because a symptom count says nothing about which parts of life are actually affected, or what someone has already built to manage.
That is why the first questionnaire here asks about seven separate areas of life rather than producing one number, and why the second records what you already do to cope. A doctor reading both gets a picture of where the difficulty actually lands, and what has already been tried.
Functional Impairment and Compensation Are Two Different Things
ADHD research separates two ideas that often get merged, and functional impairment is the one that gets overlooked. Impairment is how much daily life is actually being affected. Compensation is the strategies a person uses to manage: the lists, the alarms, the double-checking, the habit of putting something in the calendar the second it is mentioned.
They are measured separately because they behave separately, and the research holds a genuine surprise. Adults with ADHD tend to use fewer compensatory strategies than adults without it, not more, and higher strategy use goes with better executive function rather than worse. Running a lot of systems is a sign of capacity, because keeping systems running is itself an executive function job.
That cuts against the popular idea that people with ADHD are all quietly compensating their way through. Some are. Many are not, and the ones who are not may be the ones struggling most.
What This Tool Will Not Do
Let’s be straight about the limits. No fine print.
It will not score you against a norm
Neither questionnaire has published cut-offs for Australian adults. The impairment scale has its author’s own rule for flagging a domain, and that is shown. The strategy scale has no thresholds at all, anywhere, so its totals are reported as totals and left uninterpreted.
It will not combine the two into a verdict
Crossing two measures that have never been jointly validated produces something that looks precise and is not. No published research tells us what any particular pairing of an impairment profile and a strategy total would mean, so inventing a label for it would be guesswork dressed up as a result. Each questionnaire is reported on its own terms.
It will not tell you whether you have ADHD
That takes a clinical assessment, and this is a coaching practice rather than a clinical one. What the tool does is put structured, properly scored information in your hands so the conversation with a doctor starts further along.
The Assessment
Two established questionnaires, run back to back and scored the standard way. The WFIRS-S measures functional impairment across family, work, study, life skills, self-concept, social life and risk. The CABS covers fourteen executive function strategies, asking both how much you use each one and how much it actually helps.
No catch: around 15 minutes, completely private, and your place is saved in your browser so you can stop and come back. Sections that do not apply to you are marked not applicable and left out of the scoring, exactly as the questionnaire intends.
What You Get At The End
A summary built to be handed over, not just looked at.
Domain by domain scores for each area of life, with the mean score and the count of items scored 2 or 3, which is how the scale is designed to be read.
Strategy use and effectiveness reported separately, including the facet breakdown the scale’s own authors specify.
Your full item responses, so nothing is hidden behind a summary number.
Named instruments and full citation, so any clinician reading it knows exactly what was used and can check the scoring.
A plain statement of the limits, so nothing here gets mistaken for an assessment.
Nothing stored anywhere. Copy it, email it to yourself, or close the tab and it is gone.
Worth Bringing To Your Doctor
Both questionnaires here are ones clinicians already use. The WFIRS-S is the standard measure of ADHD functional impairment, meaning how much daily life is actually affected, and it is scored exactly the way Dr Margaret Weiss specifies. The CABS is a published research instrument for the other half of the picture: the executive function strategies people build, and whether they actually help. The CABS was validated against the WFIRS, so the two belong together.
That matters because assessment appointments are short and expensive. Walking in with structured answers, scored properly and attributed, does a real part of the work before you sit down. It also gives a clinician something most patients cannot articulate under pressure: the difference between not struggling and not appearing to struggle.
You Do Not Need A Diagnosis To Work On This
Coaching is not gated behind paperwork. Plenty of people I work with are diagnosed, plenty are on a waiting list, and plenty have decided assessment is not for them. What matters is whether the patterns are costing you, and whether the effort you are spending could be spent better.
If this assessment tells you that you are compensating heavily and paying for it in energy, that is not a result that needs a label attached before it is worth acting on.
Questions, Answered Plainly
No. It is a screening and self-reflection tool. Only a qualified clinician can diagnose ADHD or anything else. What this gives you is structured, properly scored information to take to that conversation.
Two established measures, reproduced in full and unaltered. One is the standard self-report scale for functional impairment across seven areas of life. The other is a published research instrument measuring compensatory strategies, both how often you use them and how helpful they are. Both are named with full attribution in your summary.
Because the questionnaires are complete. Shortening them would make the results faster and worthless to a clinician, which defeats the purpose. Your place is saved in your browser as you go, so you can stop and come back rather than doing it in one sitting.
The impairment scale includes a not applicable option by design. A few questions at the start work out which sections apply to you, and anything that does not is marked not applicable and excluded from the scoring. Your summary states which sections were excluded and why, so nothing is hidden.
That is the pattern this page exists for. It usually means your functioning is real but effortful, and the effort is invisible to everyone else. It is not a reason to dismiss what you are experiencing. It is often the clearest sign that something is being carried rather than resolved.
No. Everything runs in your browser and nothing is transmitted to us. Your progress is saved in your own browser so you can resume, and you can clear it at any time with the button on the results screen. If you choose to email yourself the summary, your address is used once to send that email and never kept.
Yes, and it is arguably more useful then. A diagnosis tells you what you are dealing with. This tells you where it is landing in your life right now and how much you are spending to manage it, which is the part that changes over time and the part coaching actually works on.
No, they answer different questions. The self-assessment asks whether ADHD is a likely explanation in the first place. This one assumes nothing about that and simply measures impact and compensation. If you are unsure where to start, start with whichever question is actually on your mind.
If The Effort Is The Problem, That Is Workable
The free discovery call is a short compatibility check: how you work, how I work, whether we would fit. Not an assessment, not a coaching session. Bring your summary if you like, or just bring yourself.
Full Disclaimer
Screening information only - not medical advice or a diagnostic service. The assessment on this page is a screening and self-reflection tool. It is not a diagnostic test, does not constitute medical or psychological advice, and does not replace assessment by a qualified health professional. Only a qualified clinician can provide a formal diagnosis of ADHD or any other condition. Do not use this page to self-diagnose or to rule anything out.
Scores are indicators, not conclusions, and the four patterns described on this page are presentational groupings rather than clinical cut-offs. A score in any range can coexist with ADHD, with another condition, or with neither. If anything here raises concerns about your mental health, speak with your GP.
The questionnaires reproduced within the tool are established instruments used under the terms their authors publish, with full attribution and citation displayed inside the tool and on every summary it produces. They are provided here for personal, non-commercial screening use.
Privacy: your answers stay in your browser and are not stored on or transmitted to our servers. Your progress is saved in your own browser so you can resume, and can be cleared at any time. If you choose to email yourself a summary, your name, email address and summary are used solely to send that email. We never share this information with anyone. Ever. View our Privacy Policy.
Lighthouse ADHD Coaching is a coaching practice, not a medical service. To the maximum extent permitted by the Australian Consumer Law (Schedule 2, Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth)), Lighthouse ADHD Coaching excludes all liability for loss or damage arising from reliance on information contained on this page.