Free test · K6
Six short questions show how much nervousness, hopelessness, restlessness and low mood have weighed on you over the last 30 days. It is a screen, not a diagnosis: the score tells you whether the distress is in a range worth bringing to a therapist or a doctor.
K6: 6 questions. Fuller: K10.
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The K6 is the short form of the Kessler Psychological Distress Scale, built by Ronald Kessler and colleagues for the US National Health Interview Survey (Kessler and colleagues, 2003). Each of the six answers scores 0 to 4, from none of the time to all of the time, for a total of 0 to 24. Kessler's team uses 13 or more as the cut-off for serious psychological distress. The K6 does not tell anxiety from depression.
Six questions show how much distress there is, not what causes it. A score of 13 or more means a conversation with a professional is worth having soon, and only a doctor or therapist can say what is going on.
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The K10 is the same questionnaire with four more questions about the same feelings, so it gives a finer picture, while the K6 is the faster check. For a closer look, take the full version: Psychological distress test (K10)
No. Its six questions mix both and give one number for general distress. To look at them apart, take the PHQ-4: its first two questions are about anxiety and the last two about depression: Quick check for anxiety and depression (PHQ-4)
Source: K6: Kessler R. C., Barker P. R., Colpe L. J., Epstein J. F., Gfroerer J. C., Hiripi E., Howes M. J., Normand S.-L. T., Manderscheid R. W., Walters E. E., Zaslavsky A. M., 2003, Screening for serious mental illness in the general population, Archives of General Psychiatry 60(2), 184-189, DOI 10.1001/archpsyc.60.2.184. © Ronald C. Kessler, PhD. 2003. All rights reserved. Based on the Composite International Diagnostic Interview © 2001 Ronald C. Kessler, PhD. All rights reserved. Used with permission. Text: English self-report K6 form, rckessler.scholars.harvard.edu/k10-and-k6-scales. Cut-off of 13: Kessler's scoring notes on the same site.
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