Describing Satisfaction
Aim: This exercise is to help you to write report findings and
conclusions that describe satisfaction.
Click here if you would like a version of this explanation and exercise in MS Word format.
Introduction:
The Findings section of a report often describes the results of questionnaires or
interviews. These often ask participants how satisfied they were with something. However,
students sometimes have grammatical problems in describing these findings.
Here is an example questionnaire item on satisfaction:
The results of the questionnaire can be written down in a table, like this:
Table1: Results of a Questionnaire on Customer Satisfaction (n=200) | ||||
Question | % Very Satisfied | % Satisfied | % Not Satisfied | % Not at all Satisfied |
|
30 | 60 | 5 | 5 |
|
10 | 30 | 50 | 10 |
|
20 | 50 | 20 | 10 |
Note: (n=200) means that 200 customers answered the questionnaire correctly, and their answers are summarised here. 'n' stands for 'number'.
Example
Findings:
As shown in Table 1, there was a high level of satisfaction with our services,
with 90% of our customers saying that they were satisfied or very satisfied. However, our
products are not as satisfactory, because half of our customers indicated that they were
not satisfied, and one-tenth said that they were not at all satisfied. Overall,
satisfaction with our company was high, with half the customers saying that they were
satisfied, and one-fifth describing a high degree of satisfaction.
Grammar to describe satisfaction:
Word | Part of Speech | Example Phrase | Example Sentence |
satisfy | verb (infinitive form) | - this did not satisfy him - this could satisfy them |
Our products satisfy our customers less than our service. |
satisfying | verb (continuous tenses) | - it is satisfying their needs | Our services are satisfying our customers' needs. |
adjective | - it is a satisfying experience | They said that our services were satisfying. | |
satisfied | verb (past tense) | - it satisfied them | Our level of service satisfied the customers. |
adjective | - he was satisfied with... - he feels satisfied with... - he is not satisfied with... |
In general, customers were satisfied with our company, but not satisfied with our products. | |
dissatisfied | adjective (meaning: not satisfied with the quality) | - they were dissatisfied with... - they felt dissatisfied with... |
Our customers are increasingly dissatisfied with our products. |
unsatisfied | adjective (meaning: not satisfied with the quantity) This word is very uncommon. |
- they were unsatisfied by... - they felt unsatisfied with... |
The meal left me feeling unsatisfied. I was still hungry. There is unsatisfied demand for our products. We could make more. |
satisfactory | adjective (more general or impersonal than 'satisfying') |
- it is satisfactory - Highly Satisfactory |
The level of service was satisfactory. |
unsatisfactory | adjective (negative) | - it is an unsatisfactory situation - Highly Unsatisfactory |
The products were unsatisfactory. |
satisfactorily | adverb | - has satisfactorily explained | No-one has satisfactorily explained the cause of this problem. |
satisfaction | noun (uncountable) |
- the level of satisfaction - the degree of satisfaction |
The level of satisfaction with our services was high. |
dissatisfaction | noun (uncountable) |
- the level of dissatisfaction - the degree of dissatisfaction |
The level of dissatisfaction with our services was low. |
Examples
Click here to see
examples of
these words. Click on the link in the examples to see the full sentence.
Note on Prepositions:
'satisfied', 'dissatisfied' and 'satisfaction' can be followed by 'with' or 'by'.
Exercise
Choose the correct word from the drop-down list:
Last updated on: Monday, February 25, 2013