Wednesday, July 9, 2014

Making Data Make Sense


Over the next few posts I am going to talk about the basics of quantitative data cleaning and analysis. Let's start by thinking about how data gets into your SPSS program- there are several options. The first option is to use Survey Monkey or other surveying software sites. They allow you to directly download your data into an SPSS file. You will need to double check that everything is as you expect, but in general the data do tend to be accurate. 

The second option is the old-fashioned way of entering the data by hand. This is commonly used when you have used paper surveys/ instruments. The concern for this method is it is easy to mistype and introduce errors into your data set. It is a good idea to have someone check your work when entering data. I also recommend doing some descriptive stats- looking at the range of the scores for each variable to make sure they are as expected (e.g., if you are expecting scores ranging between 1-5 a 55 tells you have entered a wrong number). 

Next time we will take a field trip to graduation.  Do you have an issue or a question that you would like me to discuss in a future post? Would you like to be a guest writer? Send me your ideas! leann.stadtlander@waldenu.edu

No comments:

Post a Comment