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Using how much with an action

I need to see how much you act upon this thing.

Is this a correct sentence? I think 'how much' is used for "quantity", not for frequency. Like we can say:

How much love do you have for this?

For the sentence in my question the correct structure should be:

I need to see how often you act upon this thing.

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  • Both of the "I need [....]" sentences won't have question marks after them.
    – Dhanishtha Ghosh
    Commented Dec 7, 2020 at 9:48

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The two sentences have different meanings. "How often" is about frequency. "How much" is about the strength of the action, and could be paraphrased "How strongly".

Also be aware of the different meanings of "act upon" and "act on". Technically "acted upon" means "affected" (I acted upon the screw by turning it), while "acted on" means "did something influenced by" (I acted on the information when I reported it to the police). However the two expressions are often confused.

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I would express what you are trying to convey in this way

I need to see to what extent / in what measure you act upon this thing.

The example is a bit vague, and it would help if you gave more context, but even thus I do not think that how much has to do with frequency here, but rather with 'intensity'.

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  • How much do you play cricket? How often do you play cricket? which one is correct?
    – xeesid
    Commented Dec 7, 2020 at 10:01
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    You see the context does help. You can say both, but there is difference in meaning: 'How often' = 'how frequently'. 'How much' refers less to the number of times you play in a week or month etc, but to the amount of time you spend on it in general. That's according to my understanding.
    – fev
    Commented Dec 7, 2020 at 10:03

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