Skip to content
confbooster

What this quiz is, and what it stands on.

How the quiz works, in plain terms, and then every source behind it — with a sentence on each and a link you can follow.

One section works against us. It holds the studies that rule out techniques we could otherwise be selling, and it is the largest section on this page. A list of only the supporting evidence would not be worth reading.

47 sourcesLinks checked by hand

How it works, in plain terms

What it actually measures
Thirteen everyday situations — a 1am scroll, a message left on Seen, a call from a number you don't know — and what you do in each. We ask you to rate yourself exactly once, at the very end, and that number is deliberately kept out of the score: self-ratings are the least reliable input a quiz like this has. It is there so we can show you the gap between what you assumed and what your own answers said.
What you get at the end
Two things. A Confidence Index from 0 to 100, which is a reading of how you are operating right now rather than a verdict on you. And your dominant pattern — the tendency showing up most across your answers, out of Overthinker, Pleaser, Critic and Avoider.
Why four patterns, and why that is a simplification
Each one maps onto something psychologists have measured for decades: rumination, fear of negative evaluation, self-criticism, experiential avoidance. But traits like these sit on a continuum, so any four-way split is a convenience rather than a fact of nature. Most people show some of all four; the result names the one showing up most often in your answers.
What it is not
Not a psychometric test, not a diagnosis, and not therapy. It has not been through formal validation — factor analysis on an independent sample, published reliability figures, evidence it correlates with established measures. Until that is done we call it an index, and nothing grander.
supports3 sources

Where the model comes from

The quiz measures behaviour rather than self-image, and the programme is built around doing things rather than thinking about things. Both choices come from this work.

supports5 sources

The Overthinker: rumination and worry

The first of four groups, one per pattern. The names are ours; the tendencies underneath them have been measured for decades, and most people show some of all four. This one is the same thought turned over without being resolved — before an event, and again after it.

supports7 sources

The Pleaser: fear of judgement

Dreading other people's judgement, and the habits built to manage it. Several of these studies measure how far people's predictions about others' reactions are off, which is exactly what the Pleaser chapter asks you to test for yourself.

supports6 sources

The Critic: self-criticism and perfectionism

Self-criticism, and the kind of perfectionism that is tied to distress — told apart from the high standards that are not. The trend and upbringing studies here are correlational, and the Codex treats them that way.

supports3 sources

The Avoider: avoidance and delay

Steering around discomfort, and putting things off to feel better now. The evidence here treats delay as a problem of mood and self-belief rather than of laziness.

supports4 sources

What actually has evidence behind it

These are the methods the 30-day programme is assembled from. The effect sizes below come from trials that were usually run by clinicians with real support attached — a self-guided PDF should be expected to do less.

supports6 sources

The extra tools in the Codex

The Codex adds a few tools on top of the thirty days, one set per pattern. Some rest on a meta-analysis, some on a handful of experiments, and the effects are mostly small; the book states the strength of the evidence next to each one.

rules out8 sources

What the evidence does not support

This section exists because leaving it out would make the rest less trustworthy. Several popular confidence techniques did not hold up when they were retested, and one large review found that raising self-esteem does not produce the results it is usually sold on.

limits our claims5 sources

The limits of the index, and of a PDF

The index is a structured self-assessment. It has not been through the validation a psychometric test requires, and we would rather say so here than imply otherwise anywhere else. The rest of this group is the other limit: how many people finish anything self-guided, and what helps them.

What this means for what we promise

Reading the above honestly rules out most of what this market sells. We do not claim that feeling better about yourself will get you a promotion, a relationship, or a happier life — the evidence points the other way, and success seems to raise self-regard more reliably than self-regard raises success.

What we do claim is narrower and testable by you: fewer things avoided, less time lost to replaying conversations, decisions made faster, and a handful of things finally done that had been sitting for months. That is a smaller promise than our competitors make. It is also one we can defend.

The trials behind these methods were mostly run by clinicians with a person checking in. Programmes delivered that way beat ones without, and people finish them far more often. That is the honest limitation of anything delivered as a PDF, including this one, and you should expect a self-guided plan to do less than the numbers in those papers say.

Thirty days starts the change. It does not finish it — the habit-formation work above puts the median nearer sixty-six days, with a range wide enough that averages are close to useless for any one person.

The Confidence Index is a structured self-assessment, not a psychometric test and not a diagnosis. Turning it into one would mean factor analysis on an independent sample, published reliability figures, and evidence that it correlates with established measures in the directions you would expect. None of that is done yet, so we call it an index and nothing grander.

Your dominant pattern is the one showing up most often in your answers, not a personality type. Most people show some of all four, and where you land can move over time.

Listing a paper here says nothing about its authors. None of the researchers cited are connected to Confbooster, and none of them endorse it. Spotted something we have got wrong? Write to hello@confbooster.com — corrections get made.

Start the free quiz