SPSS Software

Statistical Package for Social

Sciences
SPSS
 SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences)
was released in its first version in 1968.
 It is a computer program used for statistical analysis.
 Between 2009 and 2010 the premier software for
SPSS was called PASW (Predictive Analytics
SoftWare) Statistics.
 SPSS is the most widely used statistical package.
 In addition to statistical analysis, data management
(case selection, file reshaping, creating derived
data) and data documentation (a metadata
dictionary is stored in the data file) are features of
the base software.
Reasons for using SPSS
 SPSS is a good first statistical package for people
wanting to perform quantitative research in social
science because it is easy to use and because it
can be a good starting point to learn more advanced
statistical packages.
 Force of habit: SPSS has been around since the
late 1960s.
 Of the major packages, it seems to be the easiest to
use for the most widely used statistical techniques;
Reasons…..
 One can use it with either a Windows point-
and-click approach or through syntax (i.e.,
writing out of SPSS commands.) Each has its
own advantages, and the user can switch
between the approaches;
 Many of the widely used social science data
sets come with an easy method to translate
them into SPSS; this significantly reduces the
preliminary work needed to explore new data
Statistics functions in SPSS
 Descriptive statistics: Cross tabulation, Frequencies,
Descriptives, Explore, Descriptive Ratio Statistics
 Bivariate statistics: Means, t-test, ANOVA, Correlation (bivariate,
partial, distances), Nonparametric tests
 Prediction for numerical outcomes: Linear regression
 Prediction for identifying groups: Factor analysis, cluster analysis
(two-step, K-means, hierarchical), Discriminant
 The many features of SPSS are accessible via pull-down menus
or can be programmed with a proprietary 4GL command syntax
language. Command syntax programming has the benefits of
reproducibility; simplifying repetitive tasks; and handling complex
data manipulations and analyses.
Limitations of SPSS
 SPSS users have less control over statistical output than, for
example, Stata or Gauss users.
 For novice users, this hardly causes a problem. But, once a
researcher wants greater control over the equations or the
output, she or he will need to either choose another package or
learn techniques for working around SPSS's limitations;
 SPSS has problems with certain types of data manipulations,
and it has some built in quirks that seem to reflect its early
creation. For new users working off of standard data sets, this is
rarely a problem. But, once a researcher begins wanting to
significantly alter data sets, he or she will have to either learn a
new package or develop greater skills at manipulating SPSS.