Assessing Hoarding and Related Phenomena

The assessment of hoarding has evolved over the past two decades to more appropriately capture its key features and associated phenomena. The authors describe a comprehensive and multimethod approach to assessment, which includes questionnaires, pictorial assessment, interview-based measures, behavioral tasks, and the incorporation of reports of family members and clinicians. It begins by reviewing self-report and interview-based measures of hoarding symptoms and providing relevant psychometric information and clinical-cut off scores. It then provides information regarding the assessment of clinical features commonly associated with hoarding, such as hoarding-related beliefs, excessive acquisition, and comorbid psychopathology. It concludes the chapter by noting specific clinical considerations when assessing an individual with hoarding problems and suggesting future directions in the assessment of hoarding, including the incorporation of more standardized behavioral measures of discarding, acquiring, and categorizing.