About the test
Accelerator or brake? (BIS/BAS)
Find out how strongly you respond to possible rewards and to signs that something could go wrong. This free test uses public-domain IPIP scales for the constructs in Carver and White’s BIS/BAS model and shows whether your accelerator or your brake tends to lead.
Questionnaire / instrument: IPIP scales for BIS/BAS
The test at a glance
- Price
- Free, including your results
- Registration
- No account required
- Length
- 36 statements
- Time
- About 4 minutes
- Format
- Self-report · five response options
- Your report
- Accelerator and brake · four scales
The four scales
The report combines one inhibition scale and three activation scales into a brake and an accelerator. These are the scale names it uses:
Behavioural inhibition
The brake: sensitivity to risk, criticism and failure. The statements cover worrying, taking criticism to heart and being careful in new situations. IPIP calls this scale BIS (Anxiety).
Drive
Going hard after what you want. The statements concern pursuing goals, wanting to be in charge and trying to outdo others. This is one of the three activation (BAS) scales.
Fun seeking
Seeking new, exciting and spontaneous experiences, such as acting on a whim or trying something adventurous. This is the second activation scale.
Reward responsiveness
How happy and energised good things make you, including getting caught up when others celebrate. With six statements, it is the shortest of the four scales.
What your results show
Your result is calculated as soon as you have answered the last statement. You can preview the layout with an example report before taking the test.
- Your profile: mostly accelerator, mostly brake, strong accelerator and strong brake, or balanced, with a short description.
- Two summary scores from 0 to 100: the accelerator, which is the average of the three activation scales, and the brake.
- Your four scale scores, each marked low, average or high, with a description of what your level means.
- A note explaining that the scores show where you are on the answer scale, not how you compare with other people.
What does it measure?
Sensitivity to possible punishment and rewards: behavioural inhibition (BIS), drive, fun-seeking and reward responsiveness (BAS). The profile explores what tends to make you hold back or move forward.
Where does it come from?
These are the preliminary IPIP scales by Lewis R. Goldberg for the constructs in Carver and White’s 1994 BIS/BAS scales, which build on Jeffrey Gray’s reinforcement sensitivity theory. The questionnaire uses IPIP wording rather than Carver and White’s original items.
How is the result calculated?
Each of the four scales is the mean of its answers after reverse-keyed items are reversed, shown on a 0–100 answer scale. The accelerator (BAS) is the average of the three activation scales; the brake is the BIS scale. The profile is “strong accelerator and strong brake” when both are high; otherwise the side that leads by at least 15 points decides, and if neither does, the profile is balanced.
What can the result tell you?
The labels are an interpretation provided by this site, not diagnoses or population norms. High inhibition does not establish an anxiety disorder, and high activation does not by itself indicate impulsive behaviour.
Languages and adaptations
Some item translations are reused from our existing IPIP banks; other wording was translated for this site with AI assistance. Translation does not by itself establish that a scale has the same measurement properties in another language.
Frequently asked questions
Is the test free, including the results?
Yes. You can answer all the statements and read your full report without paying or creating an account.
Is this Carver and White’s original BIS/BAS questionnaire?
No. It uses IPIP scales written to measure the same four constructs: behavioural inhibition, drive, fun seeking and reward responsiveness. The wording, the number of statements and the scoring differ from Carver and White’s questionnaire, so your scores cannot be compared directly with studies that used the original.
How is my profile decided?
If both the accelerator and the brake are high, your profile is “Strong accelerator and strong brake”. Otherwise, the side that is at least 15 points higher on the 0–100 scale decides between “Mostly accelerator” and “Mostly brake”. If neither leads by that much, the profile is “Balanced”. These rules are our own reporting choice, not published cut-offs.
Who am I compared with?
Nobody. There are no published norms for these IPIP scales, so a score shows where your answers fall between 0 and 100. Low means an average answer below 2.5 on the five-point scale and high means above 3.5, the same limits as our Big Five test. A score of 70 does not mean you score higher than 70 percent of people.
Does a strong brake mean I have anxiety?
No. Behavioural inhibition is a normal personality tendency that is closely linked to neuroticism, and the test cannot diagnose anything. If worry or anxiety affects your daily life, our anxiety test (GAD-7) screens for symptoms, and a GP or psychologist can assess them properly.
How accurate is the test?
IPIP reports internal consistency (alpha) of .84 for inhibition, .79 for fun seeking, .77 for drive and .68 for the shorter reward responsiveness scale. That is reasonable for short scales, but any single result contains measurement error, so treat small differences between scales as uncertain. The figures come from the English statements; our translations have not been validated separately.
How is it related to the Big Five?
The brake is closely linked to neuroticism and the accelerator to extraversion. The Big Five test describes your personality more broadly, with five traits and 30 facets, and compares your scores with other test takers.
License and reuse
Public domainIPIP places its items and scales in the public domain. They may be used, copied, adapted and translated for commercial and non-commercial purposes without a fee or separate permission.
The terms below apply to the test materials. Articles, translations, software and our result descriptions may have separate terms.
Sources and further reading
Carver, C. S., & White, T. L. (1994). Behavioral inhibition, behavioral activation, and affective responses to impending reward and punishment: The BIS/BAS scales. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67, 319-333. IPIP scales: https://ipip.ori.org/newBIS_BASkey.htm