Schema · Assessment
Early Maladaptive Schemas Checklist
All 18 schemas across the five domains
Young's eighteen early maladaptive schemas, grouped into the five domains and the core childhood need each domain maps onto. Tick anything that reads as familiar rather than merely true today, then rank the strongest three. This is reflection, not a validated instrument.
Disconnection & rejection
Unmet need: Safe attachment — stability, safety, acceptance
- Abandonment / instability — the people I rely on will leave or become unavailable
- Mistrust / abuse — others will hurt, use, or humiliate me if I let them close
- Emotional deprivation — nobody will meet my needs for care, empathy, or protection
- Defectiveness / shame — if people really saw me they would turn away
- Social isolation / alienation — I am outside every group, fundamentally different
Impaired autonomy & performance
Unmet need: Autonomy, competence, a sense of identity
- Dependence / incompetence — I cannot handle daily life without help
- Vulnerability to harm or illness — catastrophe is close and I cannot prevent it
- Enmeshment / undeveloped self — I do not exist separately from the person I am fused with
- Failure — I am fundamentally less capable than my peers
Impaired limits
Unmet need: Realistic limits and self-control
- Entitlement / grandiosity — the ordinary rules and limits do not apply to me
- Insufficient self-control — I cannot tolerate frustration or restrain an impulse
Other-directedness
Unmet need: Freedom to express valid needs and feelings
- Subjugation — I surrender control to avoid anger or abandonment
- Self-sacrifice — I meet others' needs at my own expense, automatically
- Approval / recognition-seeking — my worth depends on attention and praise
Overvigilance & inhibition
Unmet need: Spontaneity and play
- Negativity / pessimism — I scan for what will go wrong and discount what goes right
- Emotional inhibition — feeling and expressing is dangerous, so I hold it in
- Unrelenting standards / hypercriticalness — good enough does not exist, only not yet enough
- Punitiveness — mistakes deserve punishment — mine most of all
The three strongest, in order
1
2
3
Most people recognise several. The ones worth working are the ones that show up in the arguments, the avoidance, and the decisions you regret.
Where the top schema shows up most often now
What I would need to experience repeatedly for it to loosen