Lab 1

Welcome to the instructions for your first Data Analysis Lab Report Assignment.

You will learn to use either SPSS or Excel to calculate summary statistics and to create charts as visual aids to compare different industries.

Step 1: Opening the Data

Either program is Ok, but make sure that you have either Excel or SPSS already installed on your computer. If you are using a web version of Excel through Office365, first save the file to your machine, and then youll need to upload it to one drive before you will be able to use it for calculations.

SPSS: simply click on SPSS1_WageswFilter.sav & click download. It will take 15-40 seconds to load depending on your connection and your machine specs. If it take longer no worries.

Excel: download the SPSS1_WageswFilter.xlsx

Step 2: Browse the Data.

Youll notice in the above screenshot that there are several different Occupations [OCC_TITLE] associated with each Major Industry. For example, I have scrolled down to data point 156, which corresponds to ind_Code 19, which is OCC_Title Social Science Research Assistants, which is within the Major Industry Life, Physical, and Social Science Occupations. After learning how to use this software to analyze data and write reports, you will have learned a key basic skill of Social Science Research Assistants. You can see that the hourly wage for people in this field is $24 per hour, and the annual wage of people in this field is $49,030. This is something that you can do with a bachelors degree in sociology, political science, or a related field.

You can look at the other rows within the Life, Physical, and Social Science Occupations and find other interesting numbers. For instance, Nuclear Technicians earn $38 per hour, about $80,000 in annual wages. Forest and Conservation Technicians earn $19 per hour, or $39,180. Also of note is the number of employees in each field, the TOT_EMP column. There are 31,500 people who work as Social Science Research Assistants, whereas there are only 6,850 people who work as Nuclear Technicians. Now that you understand how to read the relevant fields, browse some other occupations in fields which interest you and find out how much people typically earn who have jobs in your chosen career path. Pick something related to your intended major.

**Note, if you are using Excel, you will see all the same data on the first worksheet, however the first row is reserved for headings, so the data starts at Row2 instead of Row1. Therefore in the above example, the Social Science Research Assistant is on line 157 instead of 156, everything else you see so far is the same.

Step 3: Calculate your Summary Statistics. In SPSS, click on Analyze, and then Descriptive Statistics, and then Explore.

A dialog box will open so that you can indicate which fields you want to analyze. Use the arrows to place Annual Wage into the Dependent List. That is the field with the numbers, youll notice the yellow ruler icon indicates that the annual Wage variable is a interval-ratio measure, meaning it makes sense to calculate descriptive statistics including mean, median, st, dev. Etc.

The other variable, Factor list, tells the program which variable identifies the separate groups that we want statistics for. MajorIndustry is our factor.

Click OK and statistics will be generated for the annual wage for each different major industry. In SPSS the statistics will pop-up in a separate window titled Output1.

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In Excel, you will see that each of the different industries has the key data separated into different worksheets with tabs at the bottom of the screen.

Transportation is the first worksheet to the right of the main worksheet. Scroll through the transportation worksheet and notice that the data is in column H in rows 2 through 52. In column I label each of the terms for the descriptive statistics that you wish to calculate. In column J, enter the actual formulas just as we have done in class. For example, for the mean, you would enter =average(h2:h52) . You can see each of the formulas in the screenshots below. Once you have all the formulas and labels in columns I & J, catch your work to make sure the numbers match. Finally, copy and paste the labels and formulas in columns I & J into each of the other worksheets, i.e. Production, InstallRepair, Construction, etc.

Step 4: Choose 3 Major Industries to write about & carefully read over the results.

Once you have all of the descriptive statistics, you will need to write about your findings.

Choose the field in which you have already worked, for example if you have ever had a retail salespersons job, you will see that Retail Salesperson is classified as Sales and Related Occupations Major Industry. So that would be one of your three. Chose one industry based on your intended career choice. For example, if you intend to work as a Hearing Aid Specialist, you would choose Healthcare Practitioners and Technical Occupations. If you dont find the exact career that you are looking for, choose the closest thing to it. If you are looking and dont see it, please let me know and I will suggest a related job.

Step 5: Use Adobe Express to illustrate the key differences.

Go to adobe.com/express. Sign in or create an account. (use your WSSU email/canvas login)

Under Create a new project, click on Flyer or Infographic.

Use a Template or design your own background.

Add text with the key numbers (mean, st.dev, range, median, etc). Double-click to edit text.

Add Photos that illustrate your chosen profession. Be creative!

Click download

Step 6: Checklist before submitting

Should have 3 Graphics total that you are turning in

Graphics includes accurate descriptive statistics of the wages for 3 jobs (1 graphic for each job).

Graphics describe:

o a specific occupation student has had

o a specific occupation student is interested in

o a specific occupation that you just think would be fun and describes wages for that occupation

Each graphics includes at least 2 images

Text is legible

Text uses creative font/color combination

Graphic is submitted to Canvas as a PDF

Writing is original / unique / not a duplicate effort from another student.

example of what it should look like is also attached