SPSS utilizes 2 windows while you're working in it. The first window is the Data file window and the other is the Output file window. These 2 windows work in tandem and you'll generally have them both opened as you work.
The Data file contains your data and allows you to perform different actions and analyses with the data. The Output file keeps a running record of everything you do to the data, and is also where any analysis results and visuals (e.g., charts, graphs, tables) will display.
Let's go through the specifics of both of these windows and their interfaces!
The Data File window contains your data and looks kind of like a spreadsheet. You can see your variable names at the top of each column and the values of each variable within those columns. Depending on what your data is, you may see numbers and/or text as the values.
The Data File window has 2 different views. You will notice 2 tabs at the bottom of the screen. One is labelled Data View, which is what we are currently in. The other tab is labelled Variable View. If you click on Variable View, you will see the following interface:
Data View:
Variable View:
As a final note here, all of these options in the Variable View are adjustable. If you want change the number of decimals for a variable, you can do that here. If you imported data and it categorized some of the Measurement levels incorrectly, you can fix that here.
The Output window will initially look blank until you do something with your data, like run an analysis or create a graph/chart. It will look like this:
One thing that may be helpful before you start running any analyses is to turn on the option for displaying commands in the output window log. By default, SPSS does not display commands in the output window, however it can helpful to see the commands to have a running record of everything you do to your data in SPSS.
Let's go over how to turn on the Display Commands option:
Having the commands displayed in the log (output window) is especially helpful when you are doing things such as cleaning your data or making transformations to your variables, as these actions otherwise are not noted and you may forget if you have already done them. When you run an analysis or create a graph, you have the visual result of those actions, but with cleaning or transforming your data, there are not necessarily any obvious visual indicators that you have done these actions, so the Display commands in the log option is your visual indicator and record that you have done these actions.
Having the commands displayed is also helpful to maintain a record of every action you do to your data so in the future (even if you haven't looked at your SPSS files in a long time), you will know exactly what actions you have performed on your data and can easily pick back up where you left off.
You will notice the same toolbar and menubar at the top of the output window as you see at the top of the data viewer window. You have all those same capabilities from the output window, so, for example, you can run analyses from the output window by clicking the appropriate buttons.
To help give you an idea of what the output window can display, here are some examples:
If you have Display commands in the log turned on, here's what the output window will display when you import an Excel file:
Here's an example of the output tables from running a Frequencies analysis:
Here's an example of the output tables from running a Descriptives analysis:
Here's an example of creating a bar graph:
Here's an example of creating a scatterplot:
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