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ADHD Test for Kids & Teens: the SNAP-IV Explained
The SNAP-IV asks you to rate 18 everyday behaviors from the past month, split between inattention and hyperactivity. Here is what it measures, and how a clinician reads it in an ADHD evaluation.
- 18 items
- Ages 6-17
- Parent or teacher report
Available through care
This questionnaire is published by James M. Swanson, PhD, University of California, Irvine, and we don't publish it here. If it is relevant to your child's care, your Emora clinician may use it as part of their assessment.
Get a comprehensive evaluationPublic version of the questionnaire is available from the publisher.
What a SNAP-IV score can and cannot tell you
The SNAP-IV is an 18-item parent and teacher rating scale for ADHD symptoms in children and teens aged 6 to 17.
Clinicians score the parent and teacher forms side by side, take a developmental history, and interview the family before they consider ADHD.
Wherever it is used, a rating scale is a screen, not an assessment. A clinician reads it alongside a history, an interview, and often a second rater such as a teacher or the other parent before drawing any conclusion.
About the SNAP-IV
The SNAP-IV rating scale comes from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) symptom list for attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Pediatric clinics and researchers have used it for decades. You rate 18 behaviors from the past month. Nine cover inattention: focus, follow-through, organization. Nine cover hyperactivity and impulsivity: restlessness, constant motion, acting before thinking. Each one is rated from “not at all” to “very much,” and the two groups are scored separately.
A rating scale cannot diagnose ADHD. It can show whether what you see at home happens often enough, and across enough situations, to be worth an evaluation. It also shows which group of symptoms is driving it. ADHD overlaps with anxiety, sleep problems, and learning differences, so an evaluation adds your child’s history, an interview, and usually a teacher’s ratings as well.
We do not publish the SNAP-IV for anyone to fill in on their own. When it is useful for your child, a licensed clinician gives it and scores it as one piece of an evaluation. Our child psychologists run those evaluations online, usually within days of sign-up. Therapy and medication support are available afterward.
How the SNAP-IV is scored
The SNAP-IV is not one score. The inattention questions and the hyperactivity and impulsivity questions are scored separately, each against its own cutoff. Parent and teacher forms use different cutoffs.
Which one is high matters as much as whether either is. Inattention without hyperactivity looks nothing like the reverse from a classroom seat, and it is the pattern most often missed in girls. Clinicians ask for both the parent and the teacher form, because a behavior that shows up at home and not at school means something different from one that shows up in both.
A screener is not a diagnosis. Cutoffs are set to catch more than they miss, so a high score is a reason to talk to a clinician, not an answer.
Common questions
No. We do not publish the SNAP-IV on this page; it is available from its publisher. If the scale is useful for your child, an Emora clinician can administer it as part of an evaluation.
Items are rated from “not at all” to “very much.” The nine inattention items and the nine hyperactivity and impulsivity items are read as separate subscales rather than as one total, each against its published cutoff. A subscale above its cutoff is a prompt to evaluate further, not a diagnosis.
The parent and teacher forms cover children and teens roughly aged 6 to 17. For adults, clinicians use different measures such as the ASRS.
An evaluation combines parent and teacher input, a developmental and school history, a clinical interview, and standardized measures, and it rules out look-alikes such as anxiety, sleep problems, or learning differences.
Yes. Licensed child psychologists at Emora conduct ADHD evaluations for kids and teens online, usually within days of sign-up, and covered by most major insurance plans. Therapy and medication management are also available through Emora if needed.
References
- Swanson, J. M. (1992). School-Based Assessments and Interventions for ADD Students. Irvine, CA: K.C. Publishing. Official source
- Bussing, R., Fernandez, M., Harwood, M., Wei, H., Garvan, C. W., Eyberg, S. M., & Swanson, J. M. (2008). Parent and teacher SNAP-IV ratings of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder symptoms: Psychometric properties and normative ratings from a school district sample. Assessment, 15(3), 317-328. https://doi.org/10.1177/1073191107313888
SNAP-IV Teacher and Parent Rating Scale by James M. Swanson, PhD, University of California, Irvine.
Keep reading
A screener starts the conversation. Care is the next step.
Therapy, medication support, and testing for kids, teens, and parents. Online and covered by most major insurance plans.