Graphing Tutorial

Step 1: Using SPSS

  1. Open your SPSS file.
  2. Click on Analyze.
  3. Click on Descriptive Statistics.
  4. Click on Frequencies.
  5. Highlight the three variables of interest (TV network, Weekday Bedtime, and Weekend Bedtime) and click the arrow (see below) to slide them across the dialog box.
  6. Click OK.
  7. Save the ouput file onto your U drive, just to be safe. Note that there will be three tables in the output file - one for each of the variables of interest.
  8. Click on one of the tables and copy it (cntl-c).
  9. Open Excel and paste the table into Excel (cntl-v).
Step 2: Making Graphs in Excel
  1. Clean up the Excel file (e.g., make sure all of the bedtimes are listed in the format you want them to appear in).
  2. Highlight the columns of data that hold the values for your x-axis. Then click Insert, then click Column, then click the first icon in the set labeled '2-D column'.
  3. Click on the graph you have just made. Then click on the Design tab. Then click Chart Layouts (note: be sure to click on the piece highlighted in gold in the figure below).
  4. Select the layout that you want from the list of choices. It's up to you to decide whether you want a title and legend, but your graph must have labels for both the x-axis and y-axis. The choice highlighted below would enable you to label both the x-axis and the y-axis. It would also allow you to create a chart title (but not a legend).
  5. After you have selected the layout you want, label y-axis by double-clicking on the 'axis title' label next to the y-axis. Type the appropriate label (e.g., Frequency), then hit return. Repeat this process for the x-axis label (and the title if relevant).
  6. Next you need to add the correct labels to your X-axis. To do that, right click the x-axis, then click on 'Select data'.

  7. Then click the 'Edit' button.

  8. Next, you need to highlight the labels for your x-axis. Notice that I have changed the labels from the odd 12-20 scale to represent the correct hours (12:00 PM - 8:00 AM).

  9. Then click 'OK' and 'OK', again.
  10. If you are making a histogram, right click on the bars in the graph. Then click on 'Format Data Series'.
  11. Set the Gap width equal to 0 (you can do this by either typing a value in the space or using the slider).
  12. Click Close and you are done.