App Usage
Assessment

ADHD Executive Function Tools

Identify which specific apps consume your time and examine
your ability to disengage from them.

Where This Tool Helps

There is a difference between knowing you spend too much time on your phone and knowing exactly which apps are pulling you in. The first level of awareness is where most people stop. This assessment pushes to the second level - naming the specific platforms, ranking them, and then looking directly at whether you can leave when you intend to.

For people with ADHD, certain app types are reliably more disruptive than others. Short-form video, social feeds, and notification-heavy messaging apps are all designed to exploit dopamine-seeking behavior - and ADHD amplifies that pull significantly. The question "have you tried to cut back but found it difficult?" is not rhetorical. If the answer is yes, that is important clinical and coaching information, not a personal shortcoming.

The list you build here becomes the basis for more targeted decisions about where to place limits, reduce access, or redesign your environment.

How to Use This Assessment

  1. List the apps you actually use most, not the ones you think you should be using. Work tools like email and calendar are separate. This list is for the apps you open out of habit, boredom, or the urge to check.
  2. Fill in all eight slots if you can. Some people will only have five. That is fine. If you reach eight and could keep going, note the extras in the margin.
  3. Answer both behavior questions without editing. The point is not to look good - it is to have an accurate baseline. If the honest answer to "can you stop when you intend to?" is "rarely," mark that.
  4. Bring this list to your next session. The apps on this list are candidates for specific strategies - usage timers, device restrictions, notification audits. The assessment is the first step toward those decisions.
1

App Usage Assessment

What are the top apps or platforms you spend the most time on? List them in rough order — most time first.

# App / Platform
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8

Do you find it difficult to limit your usage on these apps or platforms, even when you intended to spend only a short time on them?

Yes
No
Sometimes

Have you tried to cut back on your use of these apps or platforms but found it challenging to do so?

Yes
No
Sometimes
2

Before Your Next Session

1

Look at the top two or three apps on your list. What are you actually getting from them - connection, stimulation, escape, validation? Is there a gap between what you are getting and what you need?

2

If you could remove one app entirely for two weeks, which would it be? What is the specific cost you are trying to avoid by not removing it?

3

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