Depression Anxiety Stress Scale (DASS)
What It Measures
The Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS) separates three feelings that often get bundled together. Depression covers low mood, hopelessness, and losing interest in things. Anxiety covers the physical side — a racing heart, shakiness, dry mouth. Stress covers tension, irritability, and difficulty relaxing.
Each statement asks how much it applied over the past week, rated 0 to 3 from "did not apply to me at all" to "applied to me very much." The full DASS has 42 items with 14 per scale; the widely used DASS-21 has 7 per scale. Because published norms come from the 42-item version, DASS-21 subscale totals are doubled before being read against them. It measures severity, not diagnosis.
Further Reading
Additional Notes
Licensing Notes: The DASS is in the public domain. The developers state plainly that permission is not needed to use it, and that the questionnaires and scoring key may be downloaded from the DASS website and copied without restriction. There is an optional manual for purchase.
Learn More: A youth version, DASS-Y, covers ages 7 to 18. Several shorter forms exist beyond the DASS-21 — 18-item, 12-item, and 9-item versions have been published.