Survey Scale

When creating a survey a variety of scales can be used including Likert scales and Semantic Differential scales. Both of these survey scales can be easily reproduced within a survey using SurveyGizmo.

What is the best way to use a survey scale?

Using a survey scale can help survey respondents decide where they land between two different ends of a question spectrum. For example, one end could be labeled Strongly Dislike and the other end would be labeled Strongly Like. The advantages of using the Likert scale option for a survey scale is that you are allowed to label every single bullet point, as you can see in image below:

The advantage of using the Semantic Differential scale is that you can let people decide exactly where they fall within your rating system without the possibility of potentially biasing them by adding your own terms. An example of what a Semantic Differential scale is shown below:

How wide should the scale be?

As one of our survey experts, Bill Johnston, explained to us, it depends on what type of results you expect to see. As Bill put it, “Use an odd-numbered scale and, if you expect your results to be fully distributed from the positive to the negative end of the continuum, use a 5-point scale. If you expect your results to be either positively or negatively skewed, use a 7-point scale.” Bill goes into even more detail about the effective scale length on our blog.

Start creating survey scales today

Creating a survey with either a Likert scale or even a Semantic Differential scale can be done using any of our accounts. Making an account takes less than 60-seconds and starting your survey is immediate. Just follow these quick steps and you’ll be on your way to adding scales to surveys.

Step 1: Click on the Free Trial button
Step 2: Create a 14 day Free Trial.
Step 3: Start your first online survey from scratch or use one of our pre-build survey templates.
Step 4: Add a scale to your survey and send it out to all your friends, colleagues, other survey respondents

If you have any questions or need any help upgrading or creating the account, please call us at 800.609.6480.