A Step by Step Guide for SPSS and Exercise Studies

Introduction 5
Figure 6
to name a variable with a combination of numbers and letters. By default, you
can use up to eight characters to name the values of a string variable, but you can
alter this restriction here. Select the Numeric option if a variable consists of
numbers only. Select the Date option if the values of a variable consist of dates
(e.g., date of an experiment, or date of birth of athletes).
The third column in Figure 6 is called Width. Click on a cell and use the
arrows to modify the width of a variable. The fourth column, Decimals, lets you
specify the number of decimals to use for each numeric variable. With the fifth
column, Labels, you can give a more detailed description of a variable because
you are not restricted to eight characters.
You can use the sixth column, Values, to label the values of a variable. Click
on a cell to activate the button . In Dialog box 3, the variable activity
describes the main sport of a sample of pupils. Each sport (value) has been given
a code and a description (e.g., code 1 for Aerobics). After you label the first
sport, click on Add and carry on in the same way with the second sport. When
you finish the labelling of all sports, click OK. If you want to view the labels of
values instead of their numeric codes (e.g., if you want to view Aerobics instead
of 1) in the data file, select the Value Labels option in the View menu.
The seventh column in Figure 6 is called Missing. If the data have missing
values you should specify them in Dialog box 4. For example, if a variable has
values ranging from 1–5, you can use the number 9 as a code to indicate missing
values. Depending on the range of scores, you may need to use different codes
Dialog box 2