'Rates' count on a thread

[springwood]

Can someone please kindly explain what the 'Rates' number count is that appears at the top of most threads? It's probably dead obvious, but it's had me wondering for a while..

[PLD]

Can someone please kindly explain what the 'Rates' number count is that appears at the top of most threads? It's probably dead obvious, but it's had me wondering for a while..

It's the sum of the Ratings of the individual posts within that thread...
The Posts are rated when another user clicks on one of the ratings at the foot of the post.