Testing Introduction

If you use SPSS to perform a statistical test, you need to know what you are doing. If you present SPSS with a set of numbers and a command it will do the requested calculations. But it won't double-check the choices that you as a user have made.

For some tests the number of respondents needs to be large enough, a distribution needs to be bell-shaped, the level of measurement of the variables involved needs to be right. Checking conditions like these is your responsibility.

Our website offers the following topics regarding testing of hypotheses:

• A basic example of testing
• The philosophy of testing
• Chosing the right test
• Some examples of testing

Don't forget to check the SPSS Help at http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/spssstat/v20r0m0/index.jsp for further support:

	The statistics coach (shown on the left) is a good way to chose your SPSS technique based on what you want to do and what kind of variables you have to do it.