Y-BOCS: Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale

About the survey

The Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale (Y-BOCS) measures the severity of obsessive-compulsive symptoms. A trained clinician administers it. It is not a self-report screen or a diagnostic test.

Goodman and colleagues developed the Y-BOCS.

Survey Doctor uses one combined Original Y-BOCS workflow for clinicians whose organization has an active entitlement. A full administration has three parts:

1. A 67-row symptom checklist
2. A target list for obsessions, compulsions, and avoidance behaviors
3. Ten scored severity ratings

The checklist records whether each symptom is current or past. A clinician can also identify principal symptoms. Principal symptoms must be marked as current.

The checklist is not scored.

A follow-up administration reviews the target list and repeats the ten severity ratings. It does not repeat the full checklist.

Scoring and interpretation

Each severity item scores from 0 to 4. The ten ratings produce a total from 0 to 40.

The first five ratings form the obsessions subtotal. The last five form the compulsions subtotal. Each subtotal ranges from 0 to 20.

Survey Doctor does not assign automatic severity bands or treatment recommendations to this version. The clinician interprets the total, both subtotals, the target symptoms, and change over time.

A Y-BOCS score measures symptom burden after the clinical picture has been established. It does not diagnose OCD or explain why symptoms occur.

How clinicians administer it

The full workflow starts with the symptom checklist. The clinician then records up to three targets in each group:

• Obsessions
• Compulsions
• Avoidance behaviors

The severity interview covers the past week, including today. All ten ratings are required. Survey Doctor does not prorate an incomplete administration.

Raw score-only entry is disabled. Clinicians enter the item ratings through the structured workflow so the stored response retains its version and scoring meaning.

Considerations

The Original Y-BOCS and Y-BOCS-II are different instruments. This workflow uses the Original ten-item, 0-to-4 severity structure. It must not be interpreted as Y-BOCS-II, which has different items and scoring.

This workflow uses a versioned 67-row checklist. Compare results only when the same identified version, scoring rules, and administration workflow were used.

Limitations

The score does not establish a diagnosis. It also does not replace a broader assessment of function, insight, risk, related conditions, or the meaning of a reported symptom.

Checklist completion depends on disclosure and clinician judgment. A person may not report every unwanted thought or ritual during one interview.

The standalone `ybocs-checklist` survey remains retired. Its old response model cannot distinguish current, past, and principal symptoms. The working checklist now exists only inside this combined clinician workflow.