What is the Zarit Burden Interview?
The Zarit Burden Interview (ZBI) is the most widely used questionnaire for measuring the strain on someone caring for a person with dementia. If a memory clinic, a research study or a social worker has asked you to fill one in, this is what it is and what the number means.
Where it comes from
Steven Zarit and colleagues published the original 29-item interview in 1980, while studying families caring for relatives with dementia at home. It was revised to 22 items, which is the version most services use today. Each item asks how often the caregiver feels a particular way, from never to nearly always, and the answers are added into a total.
What it measures
Caregiver burden, in the sense the research uses: the degree to which caring is felt to affect the caregiver's health, personal and social life, finances, emotional wellbeing and sense of control. The items cover time for oneself, feeling stretched between caring and other duties, tension and embarrassment around the person, strain on relationships and health, loss of privacy and social life, worry about the future, feeling one should do more or better, and the overall sense of burden.
The shorter versions
In 2001 Bédard and colleagues published a 12-item short form (ZBI-12) that keeps most of the information of the full interview, and a 4-item screening version for quick use in clinics. The short form is the one most often used in busy memory services and in apps and websites that have licensed it.
Who may use it
The ZBI is a copyrighted instrument distributed under licence by the Mapi Research Trust. Clinical services and researchers obtain it that way, and its wording is not free to reproduce. That is why Anchorly's caregiver strain check-in uses its own twelve statements over the same areas rather than the ZBI items, and why we say plainly that it is not the Zarit interview.
What the score means
A total on its own says less than people expect. Studies group totals into bands, but the cut-offs vary between studies and between the 22- and 12-item versions, and the authors themselves caution against treating any single number as a clinical threshold. What the score is good for is comparison: the same caregiver's total now against their total three months ago, or a service's caregivers before and after a support programme.
That is the idea Anchorly borrows. Twelve statements, in our own words, answered once a month, with the change since last month said plainly and a nudge toward respite when the load is heavy or growing.
If you have been asked to fill one in
- Answer for the last month as a whole, not today.
- There are no right answers and no score that makes you a bad caregiver. High strain is a signal that you need more support, and services use it to offer some.
- Ask what the service will do with the result. A score should lead to a conversation about respite, day care, counselling or practical help.
Frequently asked questions
Can I take the Zarit Burden Interview online for free?
The instrument is licensed. Copies that appear online are usually reproduced without permission, and a score from one of them means little without the context a clinician or researcher gives it. Anchorly’s own twelve-statement check-in covers the same areas in its own words and is free to use.
What is a high Zarit score?
Research studies group totals into bands, but the cut-offs differ between studies and versions, and the authors caution against treating any single score as a clinical threshold. The more useful reading is change over time in the same person.
Who should use the Zarit Burden Interview?
Clinicians, memory services and researchers who hold a licence and have a reason to compare scores across people. For a family caregiver at home, a monthly check-in that tracks your own change is more useful than a one-off score.
Keep it over time in Anchorly
Anchorly keeps a twelve-statement strain check-in month by month on your phone, in its own words, and says plainly when the load has grown.
Free, no account, works offline. Your loved one's information stays on the phone.
Sources
- Zarit SH, Reever KE, Bach-Peterson J. Relatives of the impaired elderly: correlates of feelings of burden. The Gerontologist 1980;20(6):649–655.
- Bédard M, Molloy DW, Squire L, Dubois S, Lever JA, O'Donnell M. The Zarit Burden Interview: a new short version and screening version. The Gerontologist 2001;41(5):652–657.
- Mapi Research Trust, Zarit Burden Interview (ePROVIDE), the licensing body for the instrument.
Last reviewed 2026-10-17.
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