WHO-5 Well-Being Index
A 5-item self-report of subjective psychological well-being over the last two weeks. The raw score (0–25) is multiplied by 4 to give a 0–100 percentage; lower scores indicate poorer well-being. A score of 50 or below warrants screening for depression. Administer under clinician oversight.
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
“I have felt cheerful and in good spirits”
Illustrative only. During administration items are presented one screen-set at a time; response-key direction is never shown to respondents.
Scoring & interpretation
Responses are averaged onto a 0–100 scale and compared against published screening cutoffs.
| Band | Threshold | Interpretation |
|---|---|---|
| Likely depression | ≥ 0 | A score of 28 or below indicates low well-being likely to reflect depression; a diagnostic assessment is recommended. |
| Reduced well-being | ≥ 29 | A score of 29–50 indicates reduced well-being; monitoring and possible screening for depression are recommended. |
| Adequate well-being | ≥ 51 | A score above 50 indicates adequate emotional well-being. |
Source & citation
Topp, C. W., Østergaard, S. D., Søndergaard, S., & Bech, P. (2015). The WHO-5 Well-Being Index: a systematic review of the literature. Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, 84(3), 167–176.
Scoring. The raw score (0–25) is multiplied by 4 to yield a 0–100 percentage; 50 or below warrants screening for depression and 28 or below suggests likely depression (Topp et al., 2015).
WHO-5 Well-Being Index © Psychiatric Research Unit, WHO Collaborating Centre for Mental Health, Frederiksborg General Hospital, Denmark. Free to use with attribution.