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Differential Indifference Questionnaire3

Differential Indifference Questionnaire Test

In about two minutes, the Differential Indifference Questionnaire Test uses nine statements to explore how indifference may appear in motivation, emotional expression, and persistence. Your result can help you reflect on internal, external, accommodative, and overall patterns in everyday activities and relationships.

Questions: 92 minutes

Differential Indifference Questionnaire Test: situation and reply bubbles

October 2, 2025October 2, 2025Material has been updatedOctober 2, 2025Material has been published

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2,328 completions

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Scale Explorer

How the Scales are Structured

InternalI

Measures inward-directed indifference marked by reduced motivation, personal meaning, and engagement with one’s own experiences.

example score5/18

5/18Lowexample score

3 – 5Low

6 – 10Moderate

11 – 18High

A score of 5 falls in the Low range, suggesting minimal signs of inward withdrawal and reduced personal meaning or drive in daily activity.

ExternalE

Measures the tendency to show emotional detachment and disinterest toward other people and the outside world, sometimes as a protective stance.

example score10/18

10/18Moderateexample score

3 – 7Low

8 – 12Moderate

13 – 18High

A score of 10 falls in the Moderate range, suggesting a noticeable but not extreme tendency to appear detached or impartial in external interactions.

Accommodative IndifferenceAI

Measures the extent to which indifference functions as an adaptive disengagement that leads to reduced persistence and a more careless attitude toward tasks and goals.

example score11/18

11/18Moderateexample score

3 – 5Low

6 – 11Moderate

12 – 18High

A score of 11 falls in the Moderate range, suggesting a noticeable tendency to disengage from goals or tasks under pressure while still maintaining some capacity to persist when needed.

General IndifferenceGI

Measures the overall intensity of indifference as a stable tendency across activities and social interactions.

example score48/54

48/54Highexample score

9 – 19Low

20 – 31Moderate

32 – 54High

A score of 48 falls in the High range, suggesting a pronounced tendency toward reduced motivation and emotional involvement across everyday roles and relationships.

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DATA-BASED USER COHORTS

Who Usually Takes This Test?

Therapy and coaching clients

41%OF USERS

People who feel emotionally detached, unmotivated, or “numb” and want to understand whether the indifference is internal, external, or a coping response.

Psychologists and counselors

34%OF USERS

Practitioners who need a quick, structured snapshot of a client’s indifference pattern to guide assessment and choose support strategies.

Stress and crisis groups

25%OF USERS

Individuals going through burnout, grief, high stress, or major life changes who want to see if indifference is an adaptive response to overwhelm.

BASED ON AGGREGATED, ANONYMIZED DATA FROM TENS OF THOUSANDS OF FREUDLY USERS.

Benchmarking

See How You Compare

Once you complete the test, your results are compared with real-world data from people in your country.
Below is a preview of how scores are typically distributed across each scale.

Shaded area — where most people score

Dot — the average

You — your score lands on each curve after the test— your score, after the test

InternalI

You?

Average8.4

Typical rangeTypical5.9 – 11

Possible3 – 18

ExternalE

You?

Average13.5

Typical rangeTypical11.6 – 15.3

Possible3 – 18

AccommodativeA

You?

Average13.4

Typical rangeTypical11.1 – 15.7

Possible3 – 18

General indifferenceGi

You?

Average27.2

Typical rangeTypical21.3 – 33

Possible9 – 54

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SAMPLE QUESTIONS

Example Questions From the Test

Below is a series of statements describing a person’s attitudes toward themself, other people, and their own life. Please indicate the extent to which each statement describes you. Work quickly and avoid spending too much time thinking about any one item, as the first response that comes to mind is typically the most accurate. Please note that this questionnaire is not intended to assess intelligence; therefore, there are no “right” or “wrong” answers. The primary goal is for your responses to reflect your experience as accurately as possible.

- Strongly disagree
- Disagree
- Somewhat disagree
- Somewhat agree
- Agree
- Strongly agree
- Completely disagree
- Disagree
- Rather disagree
- Rather agree
- Agree
- Completely agree
- Strongly disagree
- Disagree
- Somewhat disagree
- Somewhat agree
- Agree
- Strongly agree

These are 3 of the 9 real questions — the rest appear in the test. No sign-up needed to start.

WHAT THE TEST MEASURES

Differential Indifference Questionnaire Test - Description and methodology of the test

apathy

People who notice reduced drive, muted emotional display, or a habit of abandoning goals may use the Differential Indifference Questionnaire Test to organize those experiences. This indifference questionnaire is intended for personal reflection on how disengagement appears in activity and communication, and its profile separates several patterns instead of reducing every response to one undifferentiated score.

What This Assessment Explores

Items cover reduced concern, concealed feelings, and giving up goals or tasks after difficulty. They distinguish disengagement, detachment, and abandoned pursuits.

Four scales organize the result:

Internal (3-18) reflects low motivation, little personal meaning in activity, lethargy, inactivity, and no initiative; Low 3-5, Moderate 6-10, High 11-18.
External (3-18) reflects detachment, lack of interest, and impartiality that can mask feelings and interests and serve protective or communicative roles; Low 3-7, Moderate 8-12, High 13-18.
Accommodative Indifference (3-18) captures abandoned activities or goals, careless task attitudes, lost motivation, and secondary loss of meaning; Low 3-5, Moderate 6-11, High 12-18.
General Indifference (9-54) reflects overall indifference as a personality trait involving motivation, emotional engagement, personal meaning, and interpersonal communication; Low 9-19, Moderate 20-31, High 32-54.

Together, the indifference profile shows whether the pattern is internal, outward, accommodative, or broad.

Methodology and Scientific Basis

Each statement uses a six-point agreement scale from strong disagreement to strong agreement. Items address concern, emotional disclosure, future goals, persistence, and everyday effort. The questionnaire reports four displayed totals with bands; item weighting and reverse scoring are unspecified, so these bands are its reporting categories rather than universal cutoffs.

Item themes are conceptually consistent with the Apathy Motivation Index, whose dimensions are behavioral, cognitive, and emotional. This questionnaire is not presented as its adaptation. They are also conceptually consistent with the Dimensional Apathy Scale and Levy and Dubois’s account of motivation-related brain systems; these works establish neither authorship, validation, nor provenance.

Batson, Fultz, and Schoenrade (1987) distinguish distress from empathy and associate them with different motivational effects. Their work offers only a limited comparison for external indifference, not a scoring or validation model.

As a differential indifference assessment, the result is a structured snapshot of self-reported tendencies. It is not a clinical diagnosis: stress, context, self-awareness, and willingness to disclose can shift answers, so high or low bands call for reflection on daily examples rather than a standalone conclusion.

Author: C. Daniel Batson

Literature:

Ang, Y.-S., Lockwood, P., Apps, M. A. J., Muhammed, K., & Husain, M. (2017). Distinct Subtypes of Apathy Revealed by the Apathy Motivation Index. PLOS ONE, 12(1), e0169938. 10.1371/journal.pone.0169938
Radakovic, R., & Abrahams, S. (2014). Developing a new apathy measurement scale: Dimensional Apathy Scale. Psychiatry Research, 219(3), 658-663. 10.1016/j.psychres.2014.06.010
Levy, R., & Dubois, B. (2006). Apathy and the Functional Anatomy of the Prefrontal Cortex-Basal Ganglia Circuits. Cerebral Cortex, 16(7), 916-928. 10.1093/cercor/bhj043
Batson, C. D., Fultz, J., & Schoenrade, P. A. (1987). Distress and Empathy: Two Qualitatively Distinct Vicarious Emotions with Different Motivational Consequences. Journal of Personality, 55(1), 19-39. 10.1111/j.1467-6494.1987.tb00426.x

Updated: 2025-10-02