“I have a data file on which I’d like to carry out several regression analyses. I have four dependent variables, v1 through v4. The independent variables (v5 through v14) are the same for all analyses. How can I carry out these four analyses in an efficient way that would also work for 100 dependent variables?” […]
Question “I found a variable “v_4” in an old data file and I can’t remember how exactly I created it. The syntax I used got a bit messy, I have different files and they’re in different folders. Is there an easy way to find out which syntax files contain the expression “v_4″?” SPSS Search Syntax […]
Question “I’d like to work with a number of .sav files but they are scattered over different folders. All file names are unique. Is there any easy way to search through a number of folders for .sav files and move these into some root directory?” SPSS Python Syntax Example *1. Create random test folders and […]
Question “I’d like to completely remove the value label from a value for many variables at once. Is there an easy way to accomplish that?” SPSS Python Syntax Example begin program. variables = ‘v1 to v5‘ # Specify variables here. value = 3 # Specify value to unlabel here. import spss,spssaux vDict = spssaux.VariableDict(caseless = True) varList […]
After importing some data into SPSS, some answers ended up in a single string variable. The data are in splitstrings.sav, part of which is shown below. Excel has a nice “text to columns” function to split it but SPSS hasn’t…So you think you can syntax?Then let’s go and split this string into the original answers. Step 1 – New […]
Question “I have a data file in which all variables were measured in 2012. I’d like to suffix their names with “_2012”. What’s the easiest way to do this?” SPSS Python Syntax Example begin program. variables = ‘v5 to v10‘ #Specify variables to be suffixed. suffix =’_2012‘ # Specify suffix. import spss,spssaux oldnames = spssaux.VariableDict().expand(variables) […]
Question “I have an Excel workbook whose three sheets contain data values, variable labels and value labels. How can I apply the dictionary information from these last two sheets to the SPSS dataset after importing the data values?” Option A: Python A nice and clean option is to have Python read the dictionary information from the Excel sheets. The […]
A local supermarket held a small survey, the data of which are in minisurvey.sav. Unfortunately, the software for downloading the data in SPSS format prefixes all variable and value labels with the variable names. The screenshot below shows part of the data. Undesired Prefixes in Value Labels Clicking on some value labels in variable view confirms that they’ve […]
A teacher held a course evaluation. The data in SPSS format are in course_evaluation.sav, part of which is shown below. Students from different majors participated and now the education director wants separate Excel files for each major. A super easy way for creating these is by using SPSS with Python. We’ll walk you through. 1. Save SPSS Data as […]
Running syntax over several SPSS data files in one go is fairly easy. If we use SPSS with Python we don’t even have to type in the file names. The Python os (for operating system) module will do it for us. Try it for yourself by downloading spssfiles.zip. Unzip these files into d:\spssfiles as shown below and you’re good to go. Find All Files […]
The right way for looping over tables, charts and other procedures in SPSS is with Python. We’ll show how to do so on some real world examples. We’ll use alcotest.sav throughout, part of which is shown below. Note that you need to have the SPSS Python Essentials properly installed for running these examples on your own computer. Example 1: Simple Loop over Bar […]
An often requested feature is to export variable and value labels to Excel. This handy tool creates an SPSS Dataset containing these labels. It can either be be saved as an Excel sheet or further edited in SPSS. SPSS Create Dictionary Dataset Tool – How To Use Make sure you have the SPSS Python Essentials installed. Next, download and […]
