If you have a survey item that asks respondents to "check all that apply", you
will use the multiple response options in IBM SPSS Statistics to analyze that
item. Previously, I have shown you how to create multiple response options in SPSS.
I wrapped up that video showing you the frequency table but commenting that that
table was difficult to read, and to interpret these data would be better
presented if we could easily see the most popular responses... and we will do
that using a very specific bar chart - called a Pareto chart - in Excel.
Of course, one way to get SPSS data into Excel is to export it from SPSS...and we
might do that, if we had multiple tables; however, for the single example we can
just use cut and paste directly from SPSS. In the SPSS output window, double
click on the multiple response table to activate it. Click and drag to select
only the item names and their numbers. Copy them to the clipboard. Now we are
ready to flip over to Excel and create a Pareto chart to display the findings.
In the second row (B1), paste the values from SPSS. We want only the reasons and the
percentage of cases, so delete the second and third columns. In the first row, add
the column titles "Reason" and "Percent". I am going to double-click to expand this
first column so that we can see all of the text. Let's reduce the number of
decimals in the percentages to 1. Next, we need to sort the data. Using the command
Data -> Sort, sort on the percent column and choose sort "smallest to largest". Click OK
Now our data are in a meaningful order. To create the Pareto bar chart, go to
Charts -> Bar -> Clustered Bar. This creates a nice Pareto bar chart for us, because we
have already sorted the data. We could also make a vertical Pareto bar chart
using similar techniques. Under Charts, choose Column -> Clustered Column
Notice that if we sort the data "largest to smallest",
it reverses the order of the bars. If you want to change the orientation of the
text, you would double-click on the x-axis. For text box - text layout, change
the text direction to "rotate 90 degrees counterclockwise".
Whether you choose the horizontal version or the vertical version will
depend upon your data. You should consider which one makes the findings easiest to read.
What is the difference between a Pareto chart and a bar chart
This is a bar chart. It has been sorted based upon the labels of the x-axis, and
this makes sense because we are tracking days of the week. We can see trends and
patterns based on time. We call this a Pareto chart, instead of a bar chart.
Because it has been sorted based upon the magnitude of the values, not the
labels on the x-axis, now we can see the trends based upon the patterns of the data.
Both Pareto charts and bar charts are in the bar chart family. Choose the
one that best represents your data and shows your findings most clearly and logically.
This is a nice enough chart... but we can make it better! The percentages look bad.
Double-click on horizontal values axis. For Number, un-click "linked to source" and
then you can change the decimals to zero. Now that looks better! Click OK.
Double-click on any of the labels. This opens the format axis box. For the Font,
I want Times New Roman 12-point. That will be APA style. And click OK.
I want to be able to see all of the text on each line so I'm going to drag to
expand this chart to the right.
Delete the word "Percent". Now I slowly inch it back until I can see all of the
text, but the chart is not wider than it needs to be. Next, I want to fix those
bars. Double-click on any of the bars. For Options, let's drop that gap width to 75%.
That looks good. Now for Fill, let's change the color to a 35% grey.
That's APA style. For the Line, we could put a black line around those bars for clarity.
Now this is personal preference. The drop shadow on the bars is questionable, but I
like how it looks so I'm going to leave it in. Click OK. Now the bars would be
even better if we could see the actual percentages that they represent.
Right-click on one of the bars and then choose Add Data Labels. Good. We should
probably also double-click on the border of the finished chart and, for a Line,
change the color to "No line". That way, it'll be closer to APA style if we want
to import it into a paper. And finally, let's change the title to something like
"Reasons for not attending an art exhibit"
We would probably present our Pareto chart either in a poster, using
PowerPoint, or in a document, using Word. In either case, you can cut and paste
your chart.
APA style for titling a chart is to place the title beneath the chart.
We created a title in Excel, but for our APA style write-up, we can remove it here.
Because Word, PowerPoint, and Excel, all share editing capabilities. Click and
delete. We title the chart - which APA calls a "figure" - by typing "Figure 1."
If this was figure 2, or 6, or 10, we would number it appropriately. The title of the
figure follows right along: type Reasons for not attending an art exhibit".
Figure titles are in Sentence Case: you capitalize only the first word and
proper nouns. Finally, place "Figure 1." in italics.
Note that the figure and the title are flush on the Left margin, not indented
1/2 inch, as you would with text. And now we can see the most popular responses in
descending order and get a much clearer picture of our data.
you