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SPSS

The basics

SPSS used to stand for Statistical Package for the Social Sciences, but this interpretation has long been left aside. These days it is used in many fields and not only social science. IBM aquired the software, tried to change the name to PASW Statistics (Predictive Analytical SoftWare) but that didn't really catch on, so it quickly changed it back to SPSS (or now fully called IBM SPSS Statistics).

Although at first it might look a lot like Excel the program is entirely different. The main window only has two tabs: Data View and Variable View. In the Variable View you will see (or create) an overview of all variables that were involved (the questions on the survey), while on the Data View you will see (or enter) all the scores from all cases on these variables.

In the video below a quick introduction is given on SPSS. It goes over the difference in Data View vs. Variable View, the data file vs. output file, and the value labels option.

SPSS basics

Introduction

The basics

The variable view

Entering a survey

Special options (under construction)

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