Rating Scales

Overview — Two Places, One Setting

A rating scale is the set of options a respondent picks from when answering a rated survey question, and the numeric values NSCAT uses to average and trend those answers.

The scale is configured in two places, and they do different jobs:

Where	What it sets	Reached from
Manage Utility	The default for activities created from now on in that utility.	Administration → Utility → Manage Utility
Activity Properties	The scale used by one specific activity.	The activity's menu → Properties

HEADS UP The utility setting is a default applied at creation time, not a live link. Changing it never updates an existing activity. If you need to change an activity that already exists, do it on that activity's Properties page.

The Two Scales

NSCAT offers a choice of two, and only two, scales.

Scale	Positions	Values used in calculations
3-Point	Negative, Neutral, Positive	-1, 0, +1
7-Point	Strongly Negative, Moderately Negative, Slightly Negative, Neutral, Slightly Positive, Moderately Positive, Strongly Positive	-3, -2, -1, 0, +1, +2, +3

The values are fixed. You can rename any position, but you cannot change what a position is worth — averages, theme scores, CPRO rankings, and trend lines are all computed from these numbers.

GOOD TO KNOW Both scales are symmetrical around a Neutral midpoint of 0. That is what makes a positive or negative average meaningful in reports, and it is why the position count is fixed at 3 or 7 rather than freely configurable.

PRO TIP Choose 7-point when you want to distinguish strength of feeling and expect enough responses to make the finer gradations meaningful. Choose 3-point for shorter surveys, hard-copy collection, or when respondents are unlikely to use seven positions consistently. Whichever you pick, keep it consistent across activities you intend to trend together.

Setting the Utility Default

In Manage Utility, the Default Rating Scale Configuration panel sets what new activities inherit. Full detail is on Utilities; in brief:

· The Rating Scale toggle picks 3-Point or 7-Point.

· Customize Rating Labels (Optional) replaces the wording for any position.

· Preview: How ratings will appear to users shows the result live.

You may edit it when you are a COG Admin (any utility), or a Utility Admin whose own utility is the one on screen. Otherwise the panel shows "You have read-only access."

PRO TIP Set the utility default once, before the first activity is created, and leave it alone. Every activity then starts consistent, and cross-activity reports stay comparable without anyone having to remember to adjust each one.

Setting an Activity's Scale

Open the activity's Properties page. The Rating Scale Configuration section works the same way as the utility panel — a scale toggle, optional per-position labels, and a live preview.

[ SCREENSHOT: Rating Scale Configuration on the Properties page. ]

Rating Scale Configuration on the Properties page.

On success you get Rating Scale Saved — "The activity rating scale has been saved successfully."

Who can change it

All three conditions must hold:

1. The activity is not locked.

2. You are a COG Admin, or a Utility Admin whose utility matches the activity's utility.

3. The activity has no recorded responses (see below).

GOOD TO KNOW A locked activity disables the scale controls along with everything else, and locking also hides Properties from the activity's menu entirely. A COG Admin must unlock the activity first — see Manage Activities.

The responses lock

Once an activity has any recorded response, its scale type is frozen. Attempting to switch it snaps the toggle back to its previous value and shows:

Cannot Change Rating Scale — The rating scale type cannot be changed because this activity already has recorded responses.

You may still see a related message on the survey side:

Cannot Change Rating Scale — The rating scale cannot be changed because responses have already been submitted.

HEADS UP This lock is deliberate and cannot be overridden — not by a COG Admin, not by unlocking the activity. A response recorded as "+2 on a 7-point scale" has no honest equivalent on a 3-point scale, so NSCAT refuses rather than silently reinterpreting your data. Fix the scale before you distribute the survey link.

GOOD TO KNOW The lock is on the scale type — the choice of 3 versus 7. It does not stop you from correcting labels. Renaming a position only changes displayed wording; the underlying values, and therefore every existing response, are unaffected.

PRO TIP If an activity is already collecting responses on the wrong scale and the data so far is expendable, the only route is a new activity created with the correct scale. Decide early — the cost of starting over grows with every response.

Switching scale clears the labels

Changing between 3-Point and 7-Point on an activity discards any custom labels you had entered. This is unavoidable — the two scales have different numbers of positions, so old labels cannot be mapped onto new ones.

PRO TIP Settle the scale type first, then write the labels. Doing it the other way round means typing them twice.

Customizing Labels

Both panels list one field per position, numbered, with the standard wording as the placeholder and the position's numeric value shown as a hint. Fields are colour-coded — red for negative, grey for neutral, green for positive.

Leave a field empty and that position falls back to its standard wording. You can rename some positions and leave the rest alone.

GOOD TO KNOW Custom labels change only what respondents and report readers see. A position renamed from Slightly Positive to Somewhat Agree is still worth +1 in every calculation.

HEADS UP Keep custom labels in the same direction and order as the positions they replace — position 1 is always the most negative. Labelling them out of order will not change the maths, but it will make every report read backwards.

PRO TIP Custom labels are the right tool when your organization has house wording for survey scales, or when a translated survey needs phrasing the standard labels do not give. Check the result in the preview panel — it renders exactly as respondents will see it.

Common Problems

What you see	What it means
Cannot Change Rating Scale — already has recorded responses	The scale type is frozen. Labels can still be edited; the type cannot. A new activity is the only route.
Scale toggle snaps back on its own	Same cause — the activity has responses.
"You have read-only access" on the utility panel	You are a Utility Admin viewing a utility that is not yours.
Scale controls greyed out on Properties	The activity is locked, or the activity's utility is not yours.
Properties missing from the activity menu	The activity is locked. A COG Admin must unlock it.
Custom labels vanished	You switched scale type. Labels are cleared on switch — re-enter them after settling the type.
Changed the utility default; existing activity unchanged	Expected. The default applies at creation time only.
Two activities won't trend together sensibly	They likely use different scale types. Trend activities that share a scale.