Introduction to the Community Integration Questionnaire

The Community Integration Questionnaire CIQ) was developed by Barry Willer Ph.D. and a group of professionals and consumers to provide a measure of community integration after traumatic brain injury that could be used in the TBI Model Systems program, funded by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR). They used the following design criteria: brevity; suitable for use in an in-person or telephone interview, conducted with the person with TBI him/herself (preferably), or with a proxy; focus on behaviors rather than feeling states; no biases resulting from age, gender or socioeconomic status; sensitive to a wide variety of living situations; and value neutral.

The CIQ consists of 15 items relevant to living, loving and working, or more formally: home integration (H), social integration (S), and productive activities (P). It is scored to provide subtotals for each of these, as well as for community integration overall (See Syllabus). The basis for scoring is primarily frequency of performing activities or roles, with secondary weight given to whether or not activities are done jointly with others, and the nature of these other persons (for example, with/without TBI ).

In its current format, the CIQ can be completed, by either the person with a TBI or a proxy, in about 15 minutes. The most common method of data collection is an in-person interview, but telephone interviewing is quite common, and the TBI model systems also utilize self-administered CIQs.

Barry Willer Ph.D., who was the principal investigator in developing the CIQ, holds the copyright. Permission for use of the CIQ is freely given but should be requested, by contacting him at the Centre for Research on Community Integration at the Ontario Brain Injury Association, 3550 Schmon Parkway, Thorold, Ont L2V 4Y6, Canada, email:

No formal training and credentialing process for the administration of the CIQ exists; it is recommended that prospective users contact Dr. Willer or another experienced user for guidance in administration, mock interviews, etc.

Studies by the developer of the CIQ and his associates and others have provided evidence relevant to CIQ reliability, validity, sensitivity and other psychometric issues (See Properties).

Because of certain shortcomings of the CIQ, a research project (supported by a separate NIDRR grant) is ongoing to develop a new version, designated CIQ-2. Information on this project is available from Marcel Dijkers Ph.D., Mount Sinai School of Medicine, Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Box 1240, One Gustave Levy Place, New York, NY 10029-6574. (E-Mail: for more information).

This information regarding the CIQ was provided by Marcel Dijkers, Ph.D., of the New York Traumatic Brain Injury Model System at Mount Sinai School of Medicine and originally at the Southeastern Michigan Traumatic Brain Injury System at the Rehabilitation Institute of Michigan. Please contact Marcel Dijkers, PhD, at for more information.

If you find the information in the COMBI useful, please mention it when citing sources of information. The information on the Community Integration Questionnaire may be cited as:

Dijkers, M. (2000). The Community Integration Questionnaire. The Center for Outcome Measurement in Brain Injury. http://www.tbims.org/combi/ciq ( accessed ).*

*Note: This citation is for the COMBI web material. Dr. Dijkers is not the scale author for the CIQ.