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PublishedNICHQ Vanderbilt Assessment Scales
A pair of ADHD rating scales, one completed by a parent or caregiver, one by a teacher, that record how often specific attention, hyperactivity and impulsivity behaviours are observed, plus how the child is functioning day to day.
Quick facts
- Age range
- The 2002 NICHQ document does not state a numeric age range. It instructs raters to judge each behaviour against what is appropriate for the child's age, and the teacher form asks for a grade level, so it is used with school-age children.
- Who completes it
- A parent or caregiver, and a teacher who sees the child across the school day.
- Domains measured
- Inattention, Hyperactivity and impulsivity, Co-occurring behaviour items, Performance and functioning items
- Form types
- Parent / caregiver form, Teacher form
- Questions
- Parent initial form: 55 items. Teacher initial form: 43 items. The follow-up scales carry the first 18 core symptom questions plus the performance questions.
- Completion time
- Pending primary-source verification
- Source organization
- National Institute for Children's Health Quality (NICHQ)
Why it is used
Gather structured, comparable observations from more than one setting so a clinician can see patterns rather than a single anecdote.
Clinicians use multi-rater scales to compare settings at baseline and to re-measure after a change in support or medication.
Scoring
Symptom questions are rated on a 0–3 frequency scale and performance questions on a 1–5 scale. A symptom rating of 2 or 3 counts as an often-occurring behaviour; a performance rating of 4 or 5 indicates a problem in performance. The scorer counts positives in the inattention block (questions 1–9) and the hyperactivity/impulsivity block (questions 10–18), records a total symptom score for questions 1–18, counts positives in each co-occurring block, and averages the performance questions answered.
Interpretation
The official instructions state the scales must NOT be used alone to make any diagnosis and that information from multiple sources must be considered. As a screening threshold the document references at least six positive responses within questions 1–9 or within questions 10–18, together with at least one performance question rated 4 or 5, impairment as well as symptoms. Follow-up scales are scored as a total symptom score for questions 1–18 plus an average performance score, tracked over time.
A rating scale never establishes a diagnosis. A qualified clinician interprets results alongside history and information from more than one setting.
Limitations
A rating scale is an observation record, not a diagnosis.
Scores reflect one rater's view of one setting during one window of time.
Parent and teacher scores routinely differ; the difference is information, not an error.
Results must be interpreted by a qualified clinician alongside history and other information.
Instrument items and rights
This page describes the instrument and links to the official source. We do not reproduce the questionnaire on this site.
NICHQ makes the 2002 first edition available for free download and requests citation when it is referenced. That is not a grant of digital or commercial reproduction rights, and later-edition AAP material must not be reproduced without rights. Public pages describe and cite only.
In-product permission status: not established.
Forms
Teacher form
Covers classroom attention, task completion and peer interaction.
Youth / self-report form
The NICHQ Vanderbilt scales are informant-rated; no self-report form is published.
Frequently asked
Can the Vanderbilt diagnose ADHD?
No. It records observations that a qualified clinician interprets alongside history, school information and other assessment. Diagnosis is a clinical decision, not a score.
Do we need both the parent and teacher form?
Clinicians generally want observations from more than one setting, because attention demands at home and at school are different.
Can I see the questions here?
We describe the instrument and link to the official NICHQ source. We do not reproduce the questionnaire items on this site.
Primary sources
- 1. NICHQ Vanderbilt Assessment Scales (first edition, 2002) (opens in a new tab), National Institute for Children's Health Quality (NICHQ) (2002)
- 2. AAP ADHD toolkit / later-edition Vanderbilt materials, American Academy of Pediatrics
- Author: Threaded Care editorial team
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