User Guide

Chapter

Using the Dat

aEditor

The Data Editor displays the contents of the active data file. The information in the

Data Editor

consists of variables and cases.

 In Data Vie

w, columns represent variables and rows represent cases

(observations).

 In Variable View, each row is a variable, and each column is an attribute

associated with that variable.

Variables are used to represent the different types of data that you have compiled. A

common ana

logy is that of a survey. The response to each question on a survey is

equivalent to a variable. Variables come in many different types, including numbers,

strings, currency, and dates.

Entering Numeric Data

Data can be entered into the Data Editor, which may be useful for small data files or

for making minor edits to larger data files.

E Click the Variable View tab at the bottom of the Data Editor window.

Define the

variables that are going to be used. In this case, only three variables are

needed: age, marital status,andincome.