Investigating the Social World
SPSS Exercises
1. View the variable information for the variables AGE, CHILDS, PARTYID3, SOCBAR, RACE, and INCOME06 in the GSS2016 file you are using. Click on the “variable list” icon or choose Utilities/Variables from the menu. Choose PARTYID, then SOCBAR. At which levels (nominal/categorical, ordinal, interval, ratio) are each of these variables measured? (By the way, DK means “Don’t Know,” NA means “No Answer,” and NAP means “Not Applicable.”)
2. Review the actual questions used to measure four of the variables in Question 1 or in your hypotheses in Chapter 2’s SPSS exercise (Question 3). You can find most GSS questions at the Data Explorer website for the General Social Survey (gssdataexplorer.norc.org). Name the variable that you believe each question measures (search under “keyword”). Discuss the face validity and content validity of each question as a measure of its corresponding variable. Explain why you conclude that each measure is valid or not.
3. CONGOV is part of an index involving the following question: How much confidence do you have in
a. Executive branch of the federal government
b. U.S. Supreme Court
c. Congress
Now answer the following questions:
a. What is the concept being measured by this index?
b. Do you agree that each of these variables belongs in the index? Explain.
c. What additional variables would you like to see included in this index?