SPSS Statistics Tech Tips

Technical tips to help you get more out of SPSS Statistics

Issue: Nov 15th, 2012

Contents: Reading Text Files Transpose Data Merging Data Multiple Response Sets

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Reading Text Files

The Text Wizard can read text data files formatted in a variety of ways: Tab-delimited files Space-delimited files Comma-delimited files Fixed-field format files

For delimited files, you can also specify other characters as delimiters between values, and you can specify multiple delimiters. To Read Text Data Files:

From the menus choose: File > Read Text Data...

Choose Files of Type as Text to select the text file in the Open Data dialog box.

The text file is displayed in a preview window. You can apply a predefined format (previously saved from the Text Wizard) or follow the steps in the Text Wizard to specify how the data should be read.

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To read your data properly, the Text Wizard needs to know how to determine where the data value for one variable ends and the data value for the next variable begins. The arrangement of variables defines the method used to differentiate one variable from the next. Delimited: Spaces, commas, tabs, or other characters are used to separate variables. The variables are recorded in the same order for each case but not necessarily in the same column locations. Fixed width: Each variable is recorded in the same column location on the same record (line) for each case in the data file. No delimiter is required between variables. In fact, in many text data files generated by computer programs, data values may appear to run together without even spaces separating them. The column location determines which variable is being read.

If the first row of the data file contains descriptive labels for each variable, you can use these labels as variable names. Values that dont conform to variable naming rules are converted to valid variable names.

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Transpose
The IBM SPSS Statistics data file format reads rows as cases and columns as variables. For data files in which this order is reversed, you can switch the rows and columns and read the data in the correct format.

Transpose creates a new data file in which the rows and columns in the original data file are transposed so that cases (rows) become variables and variables (columns) become cases. Transpose automatically creates new variable names and displays a list of the new variable names.

A new string variable that contains the original variable name, case_lbl, is automatically created. If the active dataset contains an ID or name variable with unique values, you can use it as the name variable, and its values will be used as variable names in the transposed data file. If it is a numeric variable, the variable names start with the letter V, followed by the numeric value. A new string variable that contains the original variable name, case_lbl, is automatically created. User-missing values are converted to the systemmissing value in the transposed data file. To retain any of these values, change the definition of missing values in the Variable View in the Data Editor.

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Merging Data Files

You can merge two or more data files. You can combine files with the same variables but different cases or the same cases but different variables.

You can merge data from two files in two different ways. You can: Merge the active dataset with another open dataset or IBM SPSS Statistics data file containing the same variables but different cases. Merge the active dataset with another open dataset or SPSS Statistics data file containing the same cases but different variables.

Add Cases merges the active dataset with a second dataset or external Statistics data file that contains the same variables (columns) but different cases (rows). For example, you might record the same information for customers in two different sales regions and maintain the data for each region in separate files. The second dataset can be an external SPSS Statistics data file or a dataset available in the current session.

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Multiple Response Sets

Custom Tables and the Chart Builder support a special kind of variable called a multiple response set. Multiple response sets arent really variables in the normal sense. You cant see them in the Data Editor, and other procedures dont recognize them. Multiple response sets use multiple variables to record responses to questions where the respondent can give more than one answer. Multiple response sets are treated like categorical variables, and most of the things you can do with categorical variables or you can also do with multiple response sets.

Multiple response sets are constructed from multiple variables in the data file. A multiple response set is a special construct within a data file. You can define and save multiple response sets in IBM SPSS Statistics data files, but you cannot import or export multiple response sets from/to other file formats. You can copy multiple response sets from other SPSS Statistics data files using Copy Data Properties, which is accessed from the Data menu in the Data Editor window.

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Select two or more variables. If your variables are coded as dichotomies, indicate which value you want to have counted. A multiple dichotomy set typically consists of multiple dichotomous variables: variables with only two possible values of a yes/no, present/absent, checked/not checked nature. Although the variables may not be strictly dichotomous, all of the variables in the set are coded the same way, and the Counted Value represents the positive/present/checked condition. For example, a survey asks the question, Which of the following sources do you rely on for news? and provides five possible responses. The respondent can indicate multiple choices by checking a box next to each choice. The five responses become five variables in the data file, coded 0 for No (not checked) and 1 for Yes (checked). In the multiple dichotomy set, the Counted Value is 1. The sample data file survey_sample.sav already has three defined multiple response sets. $mltnews is a multiple dichotomy set.

Enter a unique name for each multiple response set. The name can be up to 63 bytes long. A dollar sign is automatically added to the beginning of the set name. Enter a descriptive label for the set. (This is optional)

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