Extreme Demand Avoidance
The EDA-QA (Extreme Demand Avoidance Questionnaire for Adults) screens for features of the EDA profile, an anxiety-driven pattern of resistance to demands and expectations, often associated with autism. Based on Richards et al. (2021). Takes about 6 minutes.
Your results
Score interpretation
It’s not about defiance
Extreme Demand Avoidance is fundamentally driven by anxiety, not willfulness. When demands, even desirable ones, feel overwhelming or threatening to autonomy, the nervous system reacts with avoidance strategies that can look like opposition but are actually self-protection.
EDA features are often first recognized in childhood, but many adults identify the pattern only after reading about it, sometimes in the context of autism evaluations, parenting, or their own therapy.
Pervasive avoidance of demands even when motivated to comply; anxiety-driven strategies including excuses, negotiation, and distraction; strong need for autonomy and control; mood lability; and often, intense imaginative engagement.
EDA is most commonly seen in autistic individuals, though not all autistic people have it and it may occur outside autism. Research by Elizabeth Newson (and later others including Richards) has described it as a distinct presentation with specific support implications.
Standard behavioral approaches that rely on compliance and external control often backfire with EDA. Effective support emphasizes autonomy, low-demand communication, and collaborative problem-solving, approaches shaped by understanding the profile.
Understanding why you resist changes everything.
If this screening resonated, a comprehensive assessment can provide the context and language to make sense of your experience, and guide approaches that actually work with your neurology rather than against it.
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