Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7
A 7-item self-report screener for the severity of generalized anxiety symptoms over the past two weeks. Public-domain instrument intended for use under clinician supervision.
This is a clinical instrument. It is not publicly self-administered — a clinician assigns it through a secure patient link.
At a glance
Detailed write-up pending
A full, citation-backed scientific write-up for this scale — overview, clinical use, and psychometrics in the voice of a dissertation "Measures" section — has not yet been authored. To honor the platform's no-fabricated-sources rule, this page currently shows only the verified registry facts above (item count, structure, scoring, and any published norms). No validity coefficients, reliability figures, or citations are shown here that cannot be traced to a named source; the authored write-up will be added once its sources have been read and recorded in the plan-integrity file.
Example item
“Feeling nervous, anxious, or on edge”
Illustrative only. During administration items are presented one screen-set at a time; response-key direction is never shown to respondents.
Scoring & interpretation
Item responses are summed to a total score and compared against published screening cutoffs.
| Band | Threshold | Interpretation |
|---|---|---|
| Minimal | ≥ 0 | Total 0–4: minimal anxiety. |
| Mild | ≥ 5 | Total 5–9: mild anxiety. |
| Moderate | ≥ 10 | Total 10–14: moderate anxiety; a score of 10 or more is the recommended cutoff for further evaluation. |
| Severe | ≥ 15 | Total 15–21: severe anxiety; active treatment is warranted. |
Psychometrics & norms
| Scale | M | SD | N | α | Metric |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Anxiety Severity | — | 3.28 | 2519 | 0.90 | empirical percentile table |
Kliem et al. (2025), Frontiers in Psychology, 16:1526181 (open access, CC BY) — cumulative population percentiles for the summed GAD-7 (7 items, 0–3, total 0–21) in a German general-population reference sample (N = 2,519; M = 2.18, SD = 3.28, Cronbach’s α = 0.90). Higher percentiles indicate more frequent anxiety symptoms. The confidence range uses the standard error of measurement from the published reliability. General-population norms are country-dependent; this is a German reference sample.
Source & citation
Spitzer, R. L., Kroenke, K., Williams, J. B. W., & Löwe, B. (2006). A brief measure for assessing generalized anxiety disorder: the GAD-7. Archives of Internal Medicine, 166(10), 1092–1097. Public domain (no permission required).
Scoring. Severity bands per Spitzer, R. L., Kroenke, K., Williams, J. B. W., & Löwe, B. (2006). A brief measure for assessing generalized anxiety disorder: the GAD-7. Archives of Internal Medicine, 166(10), 1092–1097 (0–4 minimal, 5–9 mild, 10–14 moderate, 15–21 severe; ≥10 suggested cutoff).
GAD-7 © Pfizer Inc. Developed by Drs. Robert L. Spitzer, Janet B. W. Williams, Kurt Kroenke and colleagues. No permission is required to reproduce, translate, display, or distribute it.