Workshop and presentations for ASSESS (SPSS users in Europe)

[New page 5 March 2015: updated 4 September 2017]

I have done presentations for two meetings of ASSESS (SPSS Users in Europe) held at the  University. of York (UK).  Misleadingly light-hearted titles, but serious in their treatment.  Old Dog, Old Tricks is quite fun, especially the first slide-show.  There's a joke at the end of the last one, but will you get it?

2006 
Old Dog, Old Tricks: Using SPSS syntax to beat the mouse-trap 

 History and development of SPSS and its arrival in UK.  Critical examination of the use of SPSS in major surveys (including design of SPSS saved files) and one textbook (Pallant, 2001).  Replication of exercises in syntax rather than GUI demonstrating that syntax is both easier and quicker for basic procedures.  

Hundreds of hours' work over several months, but squeezed into 10-minutes including questions as I was given the last slot of the afternoon when delegates had already begun to leave to catch their trains back to London and Scotland. However the work wasn't wasted as it provided a base from which to build the current website. 

2014 
The Beginners’ Guide to Survey Analysis Using SPSS
Training workshop: SPSS in 3 hours!!

Close Encounters of the Fourth Kind: working with alien SPSS files
(Old Dog, Old Tricks 2: eight years later)  Introduction to, and critical examination of, SPSS saved files for major surveys deposited with, and  distributed by, the UK Data Service  and other archives.  Demonstrates some of the  problems encountered and suggests solutions to make them easier to use for teaching and secondary analysis.

ASSESS 2014:  Links to files for John Hall's sessions
Lists links to materials used in both above sessions.