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      Three Question Categories for Data Analysis

      Metolius provides the flexibility of three question category types:

      1 - Demographic

      Capture typical demographic data — such as location, job title, age, department, tenure, or any custom attribute— at the start of a survey or anywhere throughout. These questions automatically generate filters (single- or multi-variate) for the survey results, enabling quick, flexible comparisons across audience segments. Their is also the option to configure response branch filtering—including up to three nested levels —for example, Country → State → City— to allow layered segmentation of your data. 

      2 - Information Gathering

      Information gathering questions in Metolius employ nominal scales, meaning that response options are categorical and unordered—like picking a fruit or a movie genre. These questions simply label responses (for example, choosing "comedy," "drama," or "documentary") without any implied ranking or numeric weight. Their primary purpose is to capture preferences or categorizations, revealing what portions of your audience favor each option—for instance, “45% prefer apples and 55% prefer oranges.”

      3 - Data Analytic

      Analytic questions, in contrast, use ordinal scales—such as a Likert-style range ("Never," "Rarely," "Sometimes," "Often," "Always")—which carry a clear ranking. Each response can be assigned a numeric value (e.g., 1 through 5), enabling quantitative evaluation. With those numbers, Metolius can graph responses, filter results, compute averages or trends, and support deeper analysis. This scoring capability allows for ranking assessments and comparison across groups.


      You can add questions from all categories or just one into your survey. Once you understand the difference between Analytic and Information gathering questions and how dynamic demographic questions filter your data you are ready to build them into your survey and reap the benefits of their functionality. 

      Accessing the response data for each category is done in a different area of the Analytics section of Metolius. Learn how to analyze each question type through their respective articles: