ADHD, Anxiety, Depression, Task Avoidance & Procrastination Worksheet

​ADHD can affect far more than attention. It can influence motivation, emotional regulation, task initiation, time awareness, nervous-system arousal, anxiety, depression, and procrastination. Many people with ADHD avoid tasks not because they are lazy, but because the task feels overwhelming, under-stimulating, emotionally uncomfortable, threatening, or difficult to organize. This worksheet helps identify the ADHD-related patterns that contribute to anxiety, depression, task avoidance, and procrastination while providing scoreable checklists, CBT and DBT strategies, grounding tools, and a personalized plan to interrupt the avoidance cycle.

ADHD, Anxiety, Depression, Task Avoidance, and Procrastination

ADHD can affect more than attention. It can also affect motivation, task initiation, reward sensitivity, emotional regulation, nervous-system arousal, anxiety, depression, avoidance, and procrastination. This worksheet helps identify the patterns that make tasks feel overwhelming, threatening, boring, or difficult to begin.

Use this page to score ADHD-related task avoidance, physical anxiety symptoms, psychological anxiety symptoms, depressive symptoms, and the short-term reward cycle that reinforces procrastination.

Mark Zauss, BC-TMC, LMHC, LPC, CCMHC, NCC, ASDCS, CCTP, CCTP II, NATC, ADHD-CCSP, C-DBT, C-PD

How ADHD Can Contribute to Anxiety and Depression

ADHD is not only a disorder of attention. It also affects executive functioning, motivation, reward sensitivity, emotional regulation, and nervous-system arousal. These difficulties are strongly connected to dysregulation in dopamine and norepinephrine pathways.

Dopamine dysregulation can make it difficult to initiate tasks, sustain effort, feel rewarded by progress, and consistently follow through. Even when a person knows what needs to be done, the brain may struggle to activate motivation and maintain goal-directed behavior. Over time, repeated difficulty with task completion, organization, deadlines, and consistency can lead to shame, frustration, low self-esteem, demoralization, and depressive symptoms.

Norepinephrine dysregulation affects alertness, attention, stress response, and physiological arousal. When demands increase, the ADHD nervous system may become underactivated and disengaged or overactivated and anxious. This can contribute to racing heart, stomach distress, muscle tension, restlessness, sweating, sleep difficulty, and feeling wired or overwhelmed.

Why Task Avoidance Happens

Task avoidance happens when the brain experiences a task as emotionally uncomfortable, under-stimulating, overwhelming, confusing, or threatening. Avoidance reduces distress in the moment, but it usually increases anxiety, shame, and pressure over time.

Task feels uncomfortable → anxiety or overwhelm rises → avoidance gives relief → relief reinforces avoidance → task pressure increases → shame and urgency build → avoidance becomes more likely next time.

The short-term reward is usually not pleasure. It is relief. When the uncomfortable feeling drops, the brain learns, “Avoiding helped me feel better.” This is negative reinforcement because the behavior is reinforced by removing something unpleasant.

Rating Scale

Rate each item based on how true it has been for you recently.

0
Not at all

1
Rarely

2
Sometimes

3
Often

4
Very Often

Educational worksheet only. This page does not replace medical care, diagnosis, emergency care, or medication management.

Sources:

American Psychiatric Association. (2022). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (5th ed., text rev.). American Psychiatric Association Publishing.
Arnsten, A. F. T., & Li, B.-M. (2005). Neurobiology of executive functions: Catecholamine influences on prefrontal cortical functions. Biological Psychiatry, 57(11), 1377–1384. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsych.2004.08.019

Barkley, R. A. (1997). Behavioral inhibition, sustained attention, and executive functions: Constructing a unifying theory of ADHD. Psychological Bulletin, 121(1), 65–94. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.121.1.65

Barkley, R. A. (2010). Differential diagnosis of adults with ADHD: The role of executive function and self-regulation. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, 71(7), e17. https://doi.org/10.4088/JCP.9066tx1c

Barkley, R. A. (2022). Taking charge of adult ADHD: Proven strategies to succeed at work, at home, and in relationships (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.
Children and Adults with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder. (n.d.). Adults with ADHD. CHADD. https://chadd.org/for-adults/overview/

Katzman, M. A., Bilkey, T. S., Chokka, P. R., Fallu, A., Klassen, L. J., & Reimherr, F. W. (2017). Adult ADHD and comorbid disorders: Clinical implications of a dimensional approach. BMC Psychiatry, 17, Article 302. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12888-017-1463-3

National Institute for Health and Care Excellence. (2018). Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder: Diagnosis and management (NICE Guideline No. NG87). https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng87

National Institute of Mental Health. (n.d.). Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health. https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/topics/attention-deficit-hyperactivity-disorder-adhd

Sirois, F. M., & Pychyl, T. A. (2016). Procrastination, emotion regulation, and well-being. In F. M. Sirois & T. A. Pychyl (Eds.), Procrastination, health, and well-being (pp. 163–188). Academic Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-802862-9.00008-6

Steel, P. (2007). The nature of procrastination: A meta-analytic and theoretical review of quintessential self-regulatory failure. Psychological Bulletin, 133(1), 65–94. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.133.1.65

​Zentall, T. R., Case, J. P., & Berry, J. R. (2021). Basic behavioral processes involved in procrastination. Frontiers in Psychology, 12, Article 769928. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.769928

​This ADHD worksheet helps clients understand how ADHD can contribute to anxiety, depression, task avoidance, and procrastination. It explains the role of dopamine in motivation, reward, task initiation, and follow-through, as well as the role of norepinephrine in alertness, stress response, physical anxiety, and nervous-system activation. The page includes scoreable checklists for procrastination patterns, physical anxiety symptoms, psychological anxiety symptoms, depressive symptoms, perceived threat, short-term reward, avoidance cycles, and task resistance. It also includes CBT and DBT tools to help clients interrupt avoidance, reduce overwhelm, challenge unhelpful thoughts, use grounding skills, and take small actionable steps toward completing avoided tasks.

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