SPSS – An Introduction

SPSS is short for Statistical Package for the Social Sciences, and it is used by various kinds
of researchers for complex statistical data analysis. The SPSS software package was
primarily created for the management and statistical analysis of social science data by IBM.

1. Basic Elements of SPSS

1.1 Interface Overview:

Data Editor

The Data Editor provides a convenient, spreadsheet-like method for creating and editing data files.
The Data Editor window opens automatically when you start a session.

The Data Editor provides two views of your data:

• Data View. This view displays the actual data values or defined value labels.

• Variable View. This view displays variable definition information, including defined variable and
value labels, data type (for example, string, date, or numeric), measurement level (nominal, ordinal, or
scale), and user-defined missing values.

Data View

Many of the features of Data View are similar to the features that are found in spreadsheet
applications. There are, however, several important distinctions:

Rows are cases. Each row represents a case or an observation. For example, each individual
respondent to a questionnaire is a case.

Columns are variables. Each column represents a variable or characteristic that is being measured.
For example, each item on a questionnaire is a variable.

Cells contain values. Each cell contains a single value of a variable for a case. The cell is where the
case and the variable intersect. Cells contain only data values. Unlike spreadsheet programs, cells in
the Data Editor cannot contain formulas.

The data file is rectangular. The dimensions of the data file are determined by the number of cases
and variables. You can enter data in any cell. If you enter data in a cell outside the boundaries of the
defined data file, the data rectangle is extended to include any rows and/or columns between that
cell and the file boundaries. There are no "empty" cells within the boundaries of the data file.

 For numeric variables, blank cells are converted to the system-missing value.

 For string variables, a blank is considered a valid value.

Variable View

Variable View contains descriptions of the attributes of each variable in the data file. In Variable
View:

• Rows are variables.

 • Columns are variable attributes.

You can add or delete variables and modify attributes of variables, including the following
attributes:
• Variable name
• Data type
• Number of digits or characters
• Number of decimal places
• Descriptive variable and value labels
• User-defined missing values
• Column width
• Measurement level

 Variable names
The following rules apply to variable names:
• Each variable name must be unique; duplication is not allowed.
• Variable names can be up to 64 bytes long, and the first character must be a letter or one of the
characters @, #, or $. Subsequent characters can be any combination of letters, numbers,
nonpunctuation characters, and a period (.).
• Variable names cannot contain spaces.
• A # character in the first position of a variable name defines a scratch variable. You can only create
scratch variables with command syntax. You cannot specify a # as the first character of a variable in
dialog boxes that create new variables. See the topic Scratch Variables for more information.
• A $ sign in the first position indicates that the variable is a system variable. See the topic System
Variables for more information. The $ sign is not allowed as the initial character of a user-defined
variable.
• The period, the underscore, and the characters $, #, and @ can be used within variable names. For
example, A._$@#1 is a valid variable name.
• Variable names ending with a period should be avoided, since the period may be interpreted as a
command terminator. You can only create variables that end with a period in command syntax. You
cannot create variables that end with a period in dialog boxes that create new variables.
• Variable names ending in underscores should be avoided, since such names may conflict with names
of variables automatically created by commands and procedures.
• Reserved keywords cannot be used as variable names. Reserved keywords are ALL, AND, BY, EQ,
GE, GT, LE, LT, NE, NOT, OR, TO, and WITH.
• Variable names can be defined with any mixture of uppercase and lowercase characters, and case is
preserved for display purposes.
• When long variable names need to wrap onto multiple lines in output, lines are broken at
underscores, periods, and points where content changes from lower case to upper case.

 Variable type

Variable Type specifies the data type for each variable. By default, all new variables are assumed to
be numeric. You can use Variable Type to change the data type. The contents of the Variable Type
dialog box depend on the selected data type. For some data types, there are text boxes for width and
number of decimals; for other data types, you can simply select a format from a scrollable list of
examples.
 The available data types are as follows:

Numeric. A variable whose values are numbers. Values are displayed in standard numeric format.
The Data Editor accepts numeric values in standard format or in scientific notation.

Comma. A numeric variable whose values are displayed with commas delimiting every three
places and displayed with the period as a decimal delimiter. The Data Editor accepts numeric
values for comma variables with or without commas or in scientific notation. Values cannot contain
commas to the right of the decimal indicator.

Dot. A numeric variable whose values are displayed with periods delimiting every three places and
with the comma as a decimal delimiter. The Data Editor accepts numeric values for dot variables
with or without periods or in scientific notation. Values cannot contain periods to the right of the
decimal indicator.

Scientific notation. A numeric variable whose values are displayed with an embedded E and a
signed power-of-10 exponent. The Data Editor accepts numeric values for such variables with or
without an exponent. The exponent can be preceded by E or D with an optional sign or by the sign
alone--for example, 123, 1.23E2, 1.23D2, 1.23E+2, and 1.23+2.

Date. A numeric variable whose values are displayed in one of several calendar-date or clock-time
formats. Select a format from the list. You can enter dates with slashes, hyphens, periods, commas,
or blank spaces as delimiters. The century range for two-digit year values is determined by your
Options settings (from the Edit menu, choose Options, and then click the Data tab).

Dollar. A numeric variable displayed with a leading dollar sign ($), commas delimiting every three
places, and a period as the decimal delimiter. You can enter data values with or without the leading
dollar sign.

Custom currency. A numeric variable whose values are displayed in one of the custom currency
formats that you have defined on the Currency tab of the Options dialog box. Defined custom
currency characters cannot be used in data entry but are displayed in the Data Editor.

String. A variable whose values are not numeric and therefore are not used in calculations. The
values can contain any characters up to the defined length. Uppercase and lowercase letters are
considered distinct. This type is also known as an alphanumeric variable.

Restricted numeric. A variable whose values are restricted to non-negative integers. Values are
displayed with leading zeros padded to the maximum width of the variable. Values can be entered
in scientific notation.

 Variable measurement level

You can specify the level of measurement as scale (numeric data on an interval or ratio scale), ordinal,
or nominal. Nominal and ordinal data can be either string (alphanumeric) or numeric.
• Nominal. A variable can be treated as nominal when its values represent categories with no intrinsic
ranking (for example, the department of the company in which an employee works). Examples of
nominal variables include region, zip code, and religious affiliation.
• Ordinal. A variable can be treated as ordinal when its values represent categories with some
intrinsic ranking (for example, levels of service satisfaction from highly dissatisfied to highly
satisfied). Examples of ordinal variables include attitude scores representing degree of satisfaction or
confidence and preference rating scores.
• Scale. A variable can be treated as scale (continuous) when its values represent ordered categories
with a meaningful metric, so that distance comparisons between values are appropriate. Examples of
scale variables include age in years and income in thousands of dollars.

 Roles
Some dialogs support predefined roles that can be used to pre-select variables for analysis. When you
open one of these dialogs, variables that meet the role requirements will be automatically displayed in
the destination list(s). Available roles are:
Input. The variable will be used as an input (e.g., predictor, independent variable).
Target. The variable will be used as an output or target (e.g., dependent variable).
Both. The variable will be used as both input and output.
None. The variable has no role assignment.
Partition. The variable will be used to partition the data into separate samples for training, testing,
and validation.
Split. Included for round-trip compatibility with IBM® SPSS® Modeler. Variables with this role are
not used as split-file variables in IBM® SPSS® Statistics.
• By default, all variables are assigned the Input role. This includes data from external file formats and
data files from versions of SPSS Statistics prior to version 18.
• Role assignment only affects dialogs that support role assignment. It has no effect on command
syntax.