Virtual Questions (VQs) let you step beyond the survey structure as it was fielded. Use a VQ to aggregate responses given on the same or different questions, create custom demographic splits, combine top 2 boxes, and more. You can add a VQ anywhere in your results and move it by dragging and dropping, just like a question in the Survey Editor.
Once generated, a VQ behaves like any other question in your data—you can filter on it, include it in exports, and use it with Banner Tables or Sig Testing.
In This Article
- Terminology
- Adding a VQ to Your Survey
- Customizing Your VQ
- Optional Presets
- Saving and Reusing Virtual Questions
Video Overview
Terminology
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Virtual Question (VQ) | A question you build inside your report from data you've already collected, rather than one you asked respondents directly. |
| Answer row | One line in the VQ editor. Each row becomes one element in the resulting chart. |
| Basic mode | The default way to build a row, using two drop-down pickers—one for the data source, one for the answers to match. |
| Advanced mode | A typed expression that defines a row when the pickers can't express the logic you need (for example PQ1A1 and not PQ1A2). |
| Base | The denominator behind your percentages. Can be set for the whole question or for an individual row. |
| Pinned questions | Configured VQs you've set aside in the left sidebar so you can reuse them across reports on the same survey. |
Adding a VQ to Your Survey
- On the Results page, click the Analysis tab in the left menu. The panel that opens is titled Data Analysis.
- Click the Virtual Question button to add a VQ to the end of your report, or drag it into place between two questions to drop it exactly where you want it.
You can add a Virtual Question at any point in your data, no matter which questions it pulls from. A brand-new VQ arrives with its editor already open, set to Single choice with two empty answer rows.
Customizing Your VQ
Click the document icon in the question's header at any time to reopen the editor. From there you can rename the VQ, add an optional description in the text field beneath the name, and build out the rows that make up your chart.
Choosing an Output Type
Click the Single choice drop-down to select the data output you'd like to aggregate.
| Output type | What it does |
|---|---|
| Single choice | Combines answer choices into fewer answer "buckets" from existing questions, so you can compare new categories against each other or against demographic traits. Each respondent lands in only one bucket. |
| Multiple choice | Works the same way as Single choice, but allows a respondent to appear in more than one bucket. |
| Matrix single choice | Combines different questions from your survey and treats each one as a sub-question—as though you'd originally asked a Slider or Progressive Matrix—so you get output features like box scores and means. Every sub-question you pick must have the same number of answer options, and you need at least two of them, or the visualization can't be generated. |
| Open ended | Places the responses to multiple Open Ended questions or answer options together, or even within a single word cloud. |
Building Answer Rows
Each answer row starts in basic mode, with two pickers.
- Use the first picker in the A1. row to select a survey question, a demographic trait, a variable, or another custom question from your report.
- Use the second picker to choose which answers to match. It stays disabled until you've picked a source, and a row needs both a source and at least one value before it counts as complete. The picker has a search field and summarizes your selection—the answer's own text for one option, Filtered to 2 for two, and All when everything is selected.
- Type a label for that element in the chart into the Please type a label... field (up to 120 characters). On Single choice, Multiple choice, and Matrix rows, you can also attach an image to the row from your survey's image library, or leave it on No image.
- Continue populating Answers using the Add action below the rows, or remove one. Each additional Answer row creates a new element in the resulting VQ chart.
- On Single choice or Multiple choice, click the Everyone else checkbox to compare your specified parameters against all other respondents in the survey. This adds a catch-all row labelled Other.
Need logic the pickers don't cover? Click switch to advanced mode on the row to type an expression by hand (for example Q1A1 or Q2A3, or PQ1A1 and not PQ1A2), or use switch ALL to advanced mode to flip every row at once. An advanced expression that's simple enough will convert back to the pickers; one that isn't stays in advanced mode and tells you so.
Generating the Visualization
Click Generate visualization. Once a chart has been drawn, the button reads Update visualization and re-enables only when you change something the chart is computed from—the question type, a pattern, the Base, or the number of rows. Editing a label or an image redraws without a re-run.
After generating the chart, the VQ becomes an active part of your survey data exactly like any other question, so it's available for filtering, exports, and custom banners for Banner Tables. A Single choice VQ with between 2 and 20 answer rows can also be used as a demographic split on the View options tab.
⚠️ Note: A Single choice question can only put each respondent in one bucket. If your answer rows turn out to share respondents, the VQ shows an overlap X.X% detected message, switches itself to Multiple choice, and takes Single choice off the list. To switch back, edit the rows so they no longer overlap.
Setting the Base
On Single choice and Multiple choice VQs, a Base control below the rows sets the denominator behind your percentages. It reads Base: N until you pick one of three options:
- Entire sample (N)—opens a number field beside the drop-down.
- Sum of all VQ answers—the total of every answer row in the VQ.
- Custom—opens an expression editor beside the drop-down.
Clearing the number or the expression sends the control back to Base: N. Individual rows can carry their own base too: click Base beside a row's label and enter a number or an expression. Row-level bases restrict which question-level options stay available, and changing the Base means the visualization has to be run again.
Optional Presets
The Optional Presets drop-down fills in your rows for you and—for some presets—renames the question to match. The drop-down is searchable, and only the groups your survey qualifies for are shown.
| Preset group | What it builds |
|---|---|
| Group Logic | Detects the question nodes created by [group] logic or Smart Loops and looks for comparable questions within each node. Questions appear only when each node is identical in structure (for example, the first question within each node is a single choice question with 5 answer options). Groups need at least two questions, and slider-type groups aren't offered. Sub-groups appear under their own Subgroup headings. |
| Questions | Individual survey questions whose answer, section, or sub-question count falls between 2 and 7. This group is built whether or not any logic group qualifies. |
| Prefix Groups | Detects questions that share the same opening word and offers them as one preset. |
| Hashtag Groups | Groups items you tagged during survey programming. When brand names aren't listed in the question text, for example, add #brandA and #brandB as appropriate to populate these groups. |
| Codebooks | For an open-ended question that has been coded, builds one row per tag plus a trailing Everyone else row, and sets a custom Base of the coded question. |
| Nested Quotas | Turns each Nested Demographic Quota group created on the Target Market page into an answer line. The Quotas heading appears only when the survey has more than one nested quota, and each row carries its quota's rule in advanced mode. |
| Demographic Traits | Each trait appears individually, and picking one builds a row per trait value. Demographics are available with every Panel survey, though the number and type vary by country. |
| Variables | Lists your survey's own variables and piping variables, plus any data you appended with the Custom Upload feature. A text custom variable with 15 or more values sets the VQ to Open ended. |
| HeatMap clusters | Lists the clusters you've defined on HeatMap questions inside their group, and builds one row per question in the group. Rename or remove a cluster and the VQ will flag that it needs to be run again. |
Working with Group Logic Presets
After you select a group, a second drop-down offers Top 1 Box (when the questions have at least 2 answer options) and Top 2 Boxes (at least 3). Top Box aggregation is offered on both ends of the answer list, to accommodate either direction you may have used while programming your survey.
Where a group carries alternative text or images, a Labels drop-down and an Images drop-down appear beside the preset to populate your rows automatically. Labels offers the group's variable texts plus a Use Q text from… option that fills each row with its full question text. Images starts with No images and lists the image sets available for the group. Make sure the questions you pick for the labels match the questions selected as VQ answer options.
⚠️ Note: Only quota groups created on the Target Market page before you launch the survey are reflected in the Optional Presets. If quotas were changed or added during fielding, you'll need to populate them into the VQ manually.
Learn more about Optional Presets.
Saving and Reusing Virtual Questions
Your VQ edits are written to your browser as you make them, so they survive a page reload. To store a VQ on the server, save the report from the Reports tab (Save, or Save as a new report). To let others see it, turn on sharing for that report and send the share link—anyone opening that link sees the VQ read-only.
If you'd like to reuse a VQ setup across reports, open the Analysis tab and drag a configured VQ into the left sidebar. It's added to Pinned questions, which is kept per user in your browser and covers every report on this survey. When you navigate to another report of the same survey, revisit the tab and click or drag the saved Virtual Question into place.
💡 Tip: Pin a VQ before you start building variations of a report. Because Pinned questions follows you across every report on the survey, you only have to set up a complex split once—then drop it into each new report instead of rebuilding it row by row.