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Scoring


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About Scoring

Whether you are creating a helpful quiz or a fun personality test, you want to use scoring. This feature gives you the ability to attach a point value to the answers of specific question types. These point values are summed up to give your respondent a final score.

Qtip: Scoring is different than recode values. Scoring is used to assign number values to your survey responses for calculating an overall response score. If you are interested in changing the values that your data exports as, see recode values.

Questions that Can Be Scored

Only the following question types are compatible with the scoring feature:

Any questions not listed here (including different types of the questions listed above, such as open-ended matrix tables and form questions) cannot be included in scoring categories.

Qtip: Scoring can be used in most project types, including surveys and 360, but it is not compatible with Engagement, Lifecycle, or Ad hoc employee research. Engagement and Lifecycle projects use scales for scoring instead.

Scoring a Survey

Opening the Scoring Editor

Where scoring can be accessed

  1. Make sure you are in the Survey tab.
  2. Click Survey options.
  3. Select Scoring.

Scoring Multiple Choice Questions

Click on any answer field to assign the default point value of 1.
Scoring page with one choice out of a question scored to indicate it is correct

Highlight any point value and type a new number to assign a different value.
Changing the score from 1 to 2

Qtip: You can use negative values and decimals in scoring! If using decimals, you must use a period (.).

Click Auto to assign sequential scores to your question, in ascending order.
Auto button at the top of an unscored question. Arrow points to show a screenshot of the ascending scores, where strongly disagree has 1 points, rising all the way down the choices until strongly agree has 5 points

Click Clear to remove scoring from for any question that has assigned scores.
Clear button above a scored question

Qtip: You don’t have to score every choice in your question! For example, let’s say 1 choice is correct, and the rest are not. You can assign the correct choice a point value while ignoring the rest.
A question that asks what the capital of Uruguay is. All answers are grayed out with no value, except Montevideo, which is green with 1 point, and is the correct answer

Scoring Matrix questions

Just like with multiple choice questions, you can click into any of the fields in a matrix table to assign a point value to that answer. However, there are quicker ways to score a matrix table.

Click on the dropdown menu for any column or row.
A personality assessment matrix. Dropdown next to first statement expanded to show options

Type in a value into the Set Scores to text box to set all the values at once for that column or row.
Score set to 1, and the whole corresponding column has 1 point for each row

Click Score Ascending or Score Descending for any column or row to assign sequential scoring.
Score ascending selected, so the answers for the row go up a point as they proceed

Scoring Text Entry questions

  1. Type in an acceptable answer for a text entry question in the box labeled Enter Text Response For Grading.
    a scoring box and a field for the correct text entry question
  2. Click the # to left to assign a point value.
    Adding a score of 1 to the left of the answer
  3. Click the green plus sign to the right of the text box to include additional acceptable answers for the text entry question.
    plus sign allowing another correct text field to be added to the text entry question's list of answers
Qtip: In order for the respondent to receive the score for a text entry question, their answer must exactly match the text you indicated in the scoring editor (except for capitalization). Because of this, scoring should never be used to grade essay-style questions.

Scoring Sliders

Sliders are unique in the way they are scored. The score value you assign to each choice acts as a multiplier for the slider value that respondent selects in the survey. If the score value is set to “5” and the respondent selects “10” on a 0–10 slider scale, then the assigned score will be 50 (5 times 10).

Example: Here is a hypothetical question where we ask residents to rate the level of damage in their maintenance request. If there are lots of requests, maintenance can help those residents with the biggest maintenance needs first.

Slider question in survey editor

Here is what the question looks like when we score it. We might add multipliers to indicate damage to one fixture is more major than damage to another. For example, all damage ratings for the fridge will be multiplied by 2, since a broken fridge can lead to the tenant’s food spoiling. Meanwhile, damage to the dishwasher is cut in half (multiplied by 0.5), since kitchen utensils can be cleaned in the sink while the dishwasher is broken.

Slider question in scoring. It looks like a list of options with a single field next to each

If you want to include your slider responses in scoring as they are, without special multipliers, make sure you assign the point value of 1 to each slider row.

Qtip: If you are having trouble scoring your slider, consider using a matrix table question instead.

Returning to the Survey Tab

When you’re done editing scores, you can return to the survey editor by clicking Back to survey builder.

Gray back to survey builder button in the upper-left

Scoring Options

There are a variety of options available to you to customize your scoring scheme. To access these options, click Scoring Options.
clicking scoring options

You can then do the following:
the different scoring options

  1. Your scoring categories will be listed at the top. You can manage your scoring categories here, which includes renaming categories, translating category names, deleting categories, and creating new categories.
  2. If desired, you can display scores to survey respondents using the Show Scoring Summary for Category options. See the Displaying the Score for Respondents section for more information.
  3. The setting Treat empty statistics for scoring categories as 0, if enabled, will take any answer choice that was not scored, and assign it a value of 0. If this option is not enabled, then any answer choice that was not scored will be treated as a null value. This affects statistics like the minimum in your reporting. With the setting enabled and answer choices unscored, the min in your reporting would be 0. With the setting disabled and answer choices unscored, the min would be null. This is most useful when using the Qualtrics 360 product.

Setting Up Scoring Categories

A Qualtrics survey can be scored multiple times for different categories. For example, in an employee satisfaction survey, you may want to add categories for work ethic, teamwork, and leadership.

By default, there is 1 scoring category labeled “Score.” To use more than 1 scoring category in your survey, you will need to create new categories.

Qtip: Because only 1 scoring category can be shown in the end of survey summary, we recommend not enabling Show Scoring Summary if you create multiple scoring categories.

creating scoring categories

  1. Click Scoring Options in the upper-right of the scoring editor.Scoring options on the upper-right of the scoring editor
  2. Click New Category.
    Adding scoring categories in the new window that opens over the scoring editor
  3. Name your category.
    Qtip: To translate the name of your scoring category, select Translate next to the category’s name.
  4. Click Save.
Qtip: If you forgot to add in a scoring category before sending out your survey, don’t worry! Scoring is retroactive for surveys and will be applied to all previously collected responses, as well as future responses. However, scoring is not retroactive for dashboards.

Choosing the Category You’d Like to Score

  1. Click the Category dropdown at the top of the scoring editor.
    category dropdown
  2. Choose the desired category.
    Choosing a category from the dropdown
  3. Score your survey questions.
    Scoring a multiple choice question

    Qtip: You can score the same question multiple times across different categories.

Deleting Categories

Click the gear next to a category and select Delete Category to remove it.

Gear to the right of a category in the scoring options window

Warning: Any scoring categories you delete are gone permanently and cannot be retrieved. You will need to manually remake any categories you want to restore. Only delete a scoring category if you are positive this is what you want to do.

Displaying the Score for Respondents

Showing Scores After Questions or At the Survey’s End

You can choose to show respondents their scores after each question, or show them a summary of their score at the survey’s end.

  1. Click Scoring Options.
    Scoring options on the upper-right of the scoring editor
  2. Choose the scoring category you’d like to display to respondents.
    Scrolling to bottom of scoring options window that opens, where it says "show scoring category summary," you can find the fields described in these steps
  3. Select At the End of the Survey to show the total score at the end of the survey, along with the respondent’s graded answers.
  4. Select After Each Question to show the graded question scores at the end of each page of the survey.
  5. Click Save.

Displaying Scores in Survey Questions and Messages

You can use piped text to show the total score at any point in your survey. Just click on the piped text menu {a} and select Scoring.

You can also use piped text to perform math operations on scores before displaying them to the respondent. For example, the equation $e{ round( gr://ScoreID/Score , 2 ) } will round the score to 2 decimal places.

Piped text in an end of survey message.

Qtip: Piped text can be used in lots of places, including questions of all kinds, descriptive texts, end of survey messages, and email tasks!

Displaying Different Messages Based on Respondents’ Scores

When it comes to assessments, we want to communicate different things to people based on how they performed. We can congratulate people who scored 100%, but we might want to provide guidance and study guides to those who scored below a 75%. Maybe we’re running a personality assessment, and want to tell the respondent what profile matches their results.

Check out the Displaying Messages Based on Scoring support page to learn more!

Category Groups

You can sort your scoring categories into groups for your organizational convenience.

Qtip: Groups are for organization. They do not combine categories. For example, if you need a “Central Score” that adds up the results of all your categories, you need to create another category.
  1. Select Show Categories By Group.
    Show Categories by Group is selected in upper-rightmost corner of manage scoring categories window
  2. Click New Group.
  3. Name your new group.
    Along the bottom, creating scoring category groups
  4. Drag and drop scoring categories into the appropriate group.
    Dragging scoring categories into the groups along the bottom
  5. Click Save when you’re finished.

Compatible Project Types

Scoring is only available in the following types of projects:

Qtip: Conjoint and MaxDiff-specific content cannot be scored.

FAQs