Preliminary Descriptive Analysis

All papers must be typed, double‑spaced and spell checked. All pages must be numbered. Writing level for graduate students: MSW graduates enter the professional practice and research arena and are expected to communicate orally and in writing at a professional level. This includes care in preparation of written materials, responsiveness to guidelines, as well as appropriate skill in language usage. Unedited, misspelled, grammatically incorrect, or carelessly organized work is not appropriate or creditable. The Writing Center at the School is a universal benefit available to all students. Please use it. Referencing and citation of all written work throughout this course should be according to the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (APA), 7^th Edition. Instructional materials are available in the library or online (http://rwc.hunter.cuny.edu/reading-writing/on-line/apa-citation-and-bibliography-form.pdf). Full referencing and citation is expected in all written work.

Participant Characteristics of GSS 2018

Refer to the GSS 2018 SPSS data and provide descriptive characteristics of the study participants.  Describe participants in terms of the mean, median and mode where applicable.  Remember the mean and median are useful only for some ordinal, and for interval and ratio level of measurement variables. For the nominal level of measurement variables, describe only the mode.

Describe the respondents in terms of the following variables:

1. hompop (number of persons living in household)

Is the mean (average) number of persons in the household what you thought it was before running the data analysis? Give a reason for your answer.

2. Hispanic (respondent’s ethnicity)

Which group has the highest representation in the sample? What might some of the reasons be for the differences in representation?

3. racecen1 (race/ethnicity/nationality of respondent)

Which race/ethnicity/nationality has the highest representation in the sample? What might some of the reasons be for the differences in representation?

• sex (respondent’s sex)

What does the frequency output tell you about the sex distribution of this sample?  Which sex has the highest representation? What might some of the reasons be for the differences in representation?

• wrkstat (labor force status)

Describe the various categories for this variable. How do you think these 2016 data may compare with labor force data collected in 2018? Explain.

• childs (number of children)

Is the mean (average) number of children what you thought it would be for U.S. households? Give a reason for your answer. What about the percentage that reported zero children? Did that surprise you? Explain your response.

• degree (Respondent’s  highest degree)

What does this variable tell you about the education level of the respondents? Is it what you expected? Give a reason for your response. 

• marital (marital status)

What does the frequency output tell you about the marital status of this sample?  Which category has the highest representation? What might some of the reasons be for the differences in representation?

• relig (respondent’s religious preference)

What does the frequency output tell you about the religious preferences of respondents?  Which religion has the highest representation? What might some of the reasons be for the differences in representation? Are the religious preference categories exhaustive and mutually exclusive?

1. age (age of respondent)

What do the Mean, Median and Mode tell you about the ages of respondents?  What is the age range? How does collapsing data into categories aide in analyzing data and interpreting findings? 

1. partyid (political party affiliation)

What does the frequency output tell you about the respondents’ political party affiliation? How do you think these findings may compare with students in the MSW program at the SSSW? Discuss.

Reflect on how the analysis of these data will help you in analyzing existing data in your agency.