Answers to SPSS Student Assistant Test Questions (Marketing Research, 8th
Edition by Burns, Veeck, & Bush)
About Your SPSS Student Assistant Questions
1. Who is your SPSS Student Assistant?
2. How can you follow the cursor and mouse clicks in your SPSS Student Assistant videos?
3. Can you “freeze frame” a video so it stops and you can study the screen?
4. What navigation options are at the top of most SPSS Student Assistant windows?
5. If you are not ready to take a test, what other option is there for you to select?
Quick Tour I Review Questions
1. How is data organized in the SPSS data editor?
2. What menu command contains operations to save a data file, open a data file, and exit
SPSS?
3. What menu item would you use for cutting, copying, and pasting in the SPSS data editor?
4. Suppose you find that a variable had been left out of the middle of an SPSS dataset. How
would you insert that variable in its proper place in the dataset?
5. A researcher has obtained the present age of the oldest child in the family and the present
age of that child’s father. What menu command would the researcher use in order to
compute a new variable to determine the father’s age at the child’s birth?
Quick Tour II Review Questions
1. What menu item is used the most by those who rely on SPSS for Windows to do various
types of statistical analysis?
2. If a person wanted to do some simple summaries of frequencies or to build a table with
SPSS, what menu item would that person use?
3. Why are there so many menu items under Analyze?
4. Name three types of graphs that can be created by SPSS.
5. If you wanted to play a sound in SPSS, how would you do it?
Milk Bone Biscuits Entering & Saving Data Review Questions
1. What are the three dog biscuit brands in the Milk Bone survey, and what is each one’s
code number?
2. What are the “rules” about a variable name in SPSS?
3. How do you enter a variable name into an SPSS dataset?
4. What is the procedure to change the number of decimal places for a variable?
5. How are numerical codes entered into the SPSS data editor?
6. How do you save an SPSS dataset?
Milk Bone Biscuits Modifying & Labeling Variables Review Questions
1. What is the default “Type” for an SPSS variable, and what do you think this means.
2. How do you specify a variable label in SPSS?
3. How does a Variable Label differ from a Value Label?
4. What is the procedure for entering in value labels for a variable?
Click on the cell in the “Values” column, then click on the “…” box to open up the
5. What appears in the SPSS data editor for a variable that has no value labels defined
when you click the View-Value Labels buttons?
6. What appearance options are available in the SPSS data editor?
Coca Cola Review Questions
1. How do you make the value labels appear on an SPSS for Windows Variable View
window?
2. Under what SPSS menu command will you find the command to “insert case?” What is a
case, and how do you insert it in the data editor?
Use the Edit-Insert Case command sequence to insert a case. A case is an observation or
3. If you happen to forget to include a variable in your SPSS data editor dataset, do you
need to start over and re-enter all the variables? If not, what can you do?
There is no need to start over. Use the Edit-Insert Variable command with the cursor
4. What happens when you sort an SPSS dataset based on the code numbers for a particular
variable. How does an ascending sort differ from a descending sort?
5. If you thought that you might have made a data entry error by keystroking a “7” instead
of a “2” for a particular variable, how could you find out if the error was in your
dataset?
Red Lobster: Recoding and Computing Variables
1. What is a reverse-scored variable, and what purpose does it serve?
A reverse-scored variable is a question where the response categories are flipped, or
reversed, as compared to most of the other questions. This is done with a semantic
2. When you recode a variable using the “into the same variable” option, what happens to
the original data values? What purpose do you think the “into different variable recode”
option serves?
With “recode into the same variable,” the original data values are renumbered according
to the recode instruction, and the original variable name is unchanged. With a “recode
3. How does a computed variable differ from a recoded variable?
A computed value is one that is created by a computation such as x = y + z where y and z
are variables in the dataset, and x is the newly created variable. A number of different
4. A researcher has coded all instances where respondents have indicated “do not know” or
“refuse to answer” with the code, “99.” How can you use the recode operation to cause
SPSS for Windows to recognize that 99 stands for missing data?
5. Below are the paired ratings for Red Lobster and Jake’s Seafood Restaurant for 10
respondents for each of three different restaurant features. (For proper spacing, make
your window full size.)
PRICES___________ SERVICE_________ MENU___________
Red Lobster Jake’s Red Lobster Jake’s Red Lobster Jake’s
2 3 3 4 4 5
3 5 4 7 4 6
4 5 5 6 2 4
5 4 6 4 3 4
4 6 3 6 3 6
5 4 2 4 4 5
6 2 4 5 6 3
5 5 3 5 3 2
6 2 6 3 3 5
3 5 3 6 2 5
The 7-point ratings were obtained on a questionnaire that instructed respondents to rate each
restaurant from low-to-high prices, fast-to-slow service, and wide-to-limited menu. Input
these responses into an SPSS for Windows dataset.
9
6
2
5
5
3
13. 00
10.00
3.00
10
3
5
2
6
3
14.00
10.00
4.00
Noxzema Skin Cream Selecting Cases Review Questions
1. If you do not use the Select Cases command, what cases in your SPSS dataset are used in
any subsequent analysis or graphs?
2. How many different types of Select Cases options are there, and what are they?
3. How would you indicate that you wanted to select all cases where AGE was equal to or
greater than 25 years?
4. Is it possible to select cases satisfying multiple conditions without keystroking the word,
“and” between the conditions?
5. What is the function of the “filter” variable created by SPSS when you select cases?
6. How can you unselect cases?
SPSS Help Review Questions
1. How many different help subcommands are there under the SPSS Help command?
2. Indicate how to search for help using the Help Topics Index function.
3. Indicate how SPSS tutorials operate.
Descriptive Statistics for Nominal Data Review Questions
1. What is revealed when you use the Utilities-Variables command in SPSS?
2. What are the proper “central tendency” statistics for nominal variables?
3. When you open the statistics options panel under the Frequencies command, all statistics
check boxes are blank. Why do you think this is the default?
4. How is the mode indicated on SPSS output?
5. What is the “Valid Percent” in an SPSS frequencies table, and how are these values
computed?
The Valid Percents are adjusted to NOT include the missing data cases. The valid
Descriptive Statistics for Scaled Data Review Questions
1. What distinguishes metric data?
2. What are the proper measures of central tendency with metric (scaled) data?
3. With the Descriptives command, the mean, standard deviation, minimum, and maximum
check boxes are checked when the options window opens. Why do you think this is the
default?
4. The median is not provided as a Descriptives Options. How can you determine the
median for a variable in an SPSS dataset?
5. Indicate whether you should use Frequencies or Descriptives to calculate the appropriate
descriptive statistics for each of the following variables.
a. Gender
Nominal scale, so use Frequencies
b. Type of dwelling
Nominal scale, so use Frequencies
c. Take home pay (exact amount)
e. First, second, and third choice of pain reliever
Ordinal scale, so use Frequencies
Working with SPSS Output Review Questions
1. How is SPSS output arranged in the SPSS Output Viewer?
2. If the navigation pane is not visible in the SPSS Output Viewer window, how can you
make it appear?
3. Indicate two ways that you can navigate around in the SPSS Output Viewer to view your
various analyses output tables.
4. How do you place a descriptive heading in your SPSS output?
5. How would you indicate an interpretation or place a note in your SPSS output?
Establishing Confidence Intervals for Means Review Questions
1. What is a one-sample t-test all about?
2. When the test value in a one-sample t-test is set to zero, what type of statistical test will
result?
3. If you wanted to determine the 95% confidence intervals for 10 different variables in a
dataset all in the same SPSS operation, how would you go about doing this?
4. What four pieces of statistical information are contained in the SPSS One Sample
Statistics output table?
5. When obtaining a confidence interval for a mean with SPSS, what is the function of the
significance level reported in the output?
Testing a Hypothesis for a Mean Review Questions
1. What SPSS analysis command sequence is used to open up the set up window to test a
hypothesis about a mean?
2. When performing a hypothesis test for a mean, what is the test value?
3. What is the “Mean Difference” in a one-sample t-test?
4. When performing a hypothesis test for a mean with SPSS, what is the function of the
significance level reported in the output?