PHP/MySQL - Count number of fields with given prefix

Given your table structure, Kaii's answer is correct.

For the future I would suggest using a real relational model like this:

CREATE TABLE QUESTION(
  ID INTEGER NOT NULL,
  QUESTION VARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,

  PRIMARY KEY (ID)
);

INSERT INTO QUESTION VALUES(1, 'My first question');
INSERT INTO QUESTION VALUES(2, 'My second question');
INSERT INTO QUESTION VALUES(3, 'My third question');

CREATE TABLE ANSWER(
  ID INTEGER NOT NULL,
  ID_QUESTION INTEGER NOT NULL,
  ANSWER VARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,

  PRIMARY KEY (ID),
  FOREIGN KEY (ID_QUESTION) REFERENCES QUESTION(ID)
);

INSERT INTO ANSWER VALUES (1, 1, 'First possible answer for question 1');
INSERT INTO ANSWER VALUES (2, 1, 'Second possible answer for question 1');
INSERT INTO ANSWER VALUES (3, 1, 'Third possible answer for question 1');
INSERT INTO ANSWER VALUES (4, 2, 'First possible answer for question 2');
INSERT INTO ANSWER VALUES (5, 2, 'Second possible answer for question 2');
INSERT INTO ANSWER VALUES (6, 3, 'First possible answer for question 3');
INSERT INTO ANSWER VALUES (7, 3, 'Second possible answer for question 3');
INSERT INTO ANSWER VALUES (8, 3, 'Third possible answer for question 3');
INSERT INTO ANSWER VALUES (9, 3, 'Fourth possible answer for question 3');

SELECT
  QUESTION.ID,
  COUNT(*) as NB_ANSWER
FROM QUESTION
INNER JOIN ANSWER ON QUESTION.ID = ANSWER.ID_QUESTION
GROUP BY QUESTION.ID
ORDER BY QUESTION.ID;

See it work here: http://sqlfiddle.com/#!3/0025a/3/0

To solve this in SQL you would have to list all field names explicitly .. Assuming your field values are set to NULL when no data is given, an SQL solution may look like this:

SELECT *, 
    ( answer1_a IS NOT NULL +
      answer1_b IS NOT NULL +
      answer1_c IS NOT NULL +
      answer1_d IS NOT NULL +
      answer1_e IS NOT NULL ) AS number_of_answers
FROM answers

A scalable approach (that grows automatically when you change the table structure e.g. to insert a new answer 'f') would be to do this kind of calculation in PHP:

<?php
$res = mysql_query("SELECT * FROM answers");
while ( $row = mysql_fetch_assoc($res) ) {
    $count = 0;
    foreach ( $row as $fieldname => $value ) {
        if ( strncmp($fieldname, 'answer1_', 8) === 0 &&
             $value !== NULL ) {
            $count++;
        }
    }
    $row['number_of_answers'] = $count;
    $resultset[] = $row;
}
print_r($resultset);

However, the PHP solution has the drawback that you can not easily use a HAVING or WHERE clause in your SELECT statement to find (for example) all questions that have 4 possible answers.