Somebody has just pointed me to a website (and a further googling shows it to be common on the web) where feedback is used as a countable noun, (i.e., it can be counted and has a plural form). Is this a British English usage? What say all of ye?

I say nay.

I say nay too.

(That's two UK feedbacks so far. )

I've never seen it used that way, but it makes sense: 'We've had two feedbacks asking about...'. An alternative like 'two pieces of feedback' seems to reify it too much, and 'two items of feedback' though better still sounds like a circumlocution. There's nothing in the form of the word 'feedback' to argue against its being countable.

aput says, "it makes sense: 'We've had two feedbacks asking about...'."

Musing here. If 'feedback' is a countable noun, then it would have a plural form, but wouldn't the proper plural be feedsback rather than feedbacks?

I say a resounding nay.

Googling is interesting. 'Feedbacks' isn't rare: with 1.5 million, it would seem on first blush to have been legitimatized by usage. (I'd hate to take a prescriptivist attitude! ) But on the other hand, there are far more hits, 190 million, for the singular form feedback. With a word so very common in the singular, 'only' 1.5 million hits for the plural form is not a lot, but rather is extremely few, suggesting that most people disapprove of that pluralizing.

As to (how shall I say this) educated usage: In google-news, feedback has over 8,500 hits but feedbacks has only 22 [eliminating a few in press releases or a quote of spoken remarks]. And of those 22, the majority are not from the US nor UK, but from places where english is not the primary language.* So I would not take them as indicating that the term is part of mainstream proper english.

A very interesting question, jheem.

*8 US
4 each: India, Philippines
2 UK
1 each: Brunei, France, Thailand, Tibet]

Feedback is a very common term in the training world and I would always consider it uncountable.

"...Let's have some feedback on this..." would be a normal use and the feedback could be from one or from multiple sources.

I believe (although I haven't checked) that the term came into common use from its specialist application in the electronics field where it refers to the phenomenon of a signal source detecting itself and thus increasing by amplifying itself. The well-known "howling" that happens when a loudpeaker and a microphone are too close together is an example of feedback of this kind.

Which was the original use of the phrase: the one you are referring to above or the scientific version that gives rise to wonderful guitar noises such as the Jesus and Mary Chain?

I hadn't thought of it, Richard, but you're no doubt right. The OED (1st ed. supplement) gives a citation from 1923 from Wireless magazine. I suppose feedback does not always howl, but I wonder if the term in its request for information meaning developed from the more familiar piercing noise of electronic feedback?

Thanks all.

quote:

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I suppose feedback does not always howl, but I wonder if the term in its request for information meaning developed from the more familiar piercing noise of electronic feedback?

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No. Feedback in electrical engineering means mixing part of the output signal into the input signal or signals. In control systems the output is usually subtracted from a desired position (input) signal to create an error signal (the difference between where you are and where you want to be); this used to drive the controlled thing in the right direction to correct the error. The existence of a feedback loop is the definition of closed-loop control. If the control system we are describing is you driving a car, the feedback signal is your visual awareness of where you are. The tremor from Parkinson's disease, as I understand it, is a result of a delay in proprioceptive position information fed back to the brain. In communications theory (from which the word probably made the leap into popular culture) feedback is a signal from a receiver back to a transmitter; the transmitter can use this information (e.g. more power, send more slowly) to optimize communication.
In electrical engineering, at least, positive feedback (like microphone squeal) is generally Bad and negative feedback (where the fed-back signal is subtracted from an input) is generally Good.

Quote: " In communications theory (from which the word probably made the leap into popular culture) ..."

I'd be curious to know where the word originated. I'd have guessed that it began with electric guitars, but OnlineEtymology it dates back to the 1920s. Unfortunately, that source gives no further details.

Feedback is a non-countable noun. But there are instances when non-countable nouns can be thought of as countable nouns. Someone pointed out (I think it was Bob Hale on the APS forum) that coffee is a non-countable noun, yet we often treat it as a countable noun. We may order "three coffees" at a restaurant, meaning three cups of coffee. Likewise, we order fries ("chips" to Brits), when we mean an order of fries. When we order "three fries," we don't want just three fries, but three orders of fries. If you're a waitress or waiter and get an order for two hamburgers, three chicken sandwiches, and five orders of fries, you might place the order as "two burgers, three chickens, and five fries." I don't think anyone would think you really wanted three chickens, but rather three chicken sandwiches. If you had a survey and received received 1000 responses, I think you could legitimately refer to them as 1000 instances of feedback or 1000 feedbacks. I don't particularly like "feedbacks," but I can't really fault it, either. If you can't accept "feedbacks," then you should never order "a coffee." Order a cup of coffee, instead.

Tinman

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