Our SPSS export feature not only allows you to export your data to SPSS, but will automatically setup and import your variable names, variable types, titles and value labels for SPSS as well. We do this by exporting directly to SPSS's proprietary .SAV format from SurveyGizmo which makes the export process clean and easy.
What is SPSS?
SurveyGizmo has some very powerful, built-in reporting features but if you're looking for serious, in depth statistical analysis you just can't get better than SPSS. SPSS is an analytics software tool used by marketers and researchers around the world. Most top research agencies use SPSS to analyze survey data and mine text data to get the most out of their research projects. If your company has a copy of SPSS and you're looking for a more advanced reporting tool, this export is an excellent option.
The data from any survey with SurveyGizmo can be exported to SPSS without any of the below preparations. However, following the below best practices will result in a data file with meaningful definitions for you and your colleagues to analyze.
Define SPSS Variable Names
SPSS Variable Names are not required (SurveyGizmo will generate them for you) however they will make your life so much easier when you jump in to do your analysis. Variable Names can be defined in 2 locations, but we recommend making your changes in one or the other:
Defining SPSS Variable Names During the Survey Build
While building your survey you can define SPSS variable names for each of your questions on Logic tab of each question. For many questions there will be multiple fields. This is because this question collects and stores multiple data points. For example the below question is a Textbox List. Respondents enter a movie for each Genre so there are 4 variables on output.
Defining SPSS Variable Names in Bulk within an SPSS Export
On the General tab of an SPSS export you can customize the Variable field. These will be populated by default either by what you defined on the Build tab of the survey or with our auto-generated SPSS variable names. You can customize them here in bulk (make sure to follow the variable name limitations listed below).
If you'd like to save these variable names to the survey so they are available for future exports select the option to Update SPSS variable names in the survey for later exports.
Limitations for Update SPSS variable names in the survey for later exports:
- This will not work with piped variables, they will have to be renamed every time.
- This will not work with system variables (ResponseID > Postal), they will have to be renamed every time.
SPSS Variable Name Limitations:
- SPSS Variable names cannot start with numbers.
- SPSS Variable names cannot include special characters.
- Duplicate variable names are also not permitted in SPSS (our system will identify any duplicates in the General tab of your export).
- For older versions of SPSS (pre 12.0) there is a character limit of 8.
- Variable names cannot end with an underscore or a period.
- Variable names with reserved words are not allowed. Learn more about reserved words.
Learn more about SPSS variable name limitations.
Use Numeric Reporting Values
Use numeric reporting values that are meaningful to you. To learn more about specifying reporting values visit our Reporting Values Tutorial.
For example, yes=1 and no=2.
This is important only for questions that export as labeled values. This includes Radio Button, Dropdown Menu, Image Select (Single), Dropdown Menu List, Rating (Likert Scale), Radio Button Grid.
If you do not use numeric reporting values our system will just use the answer option SKUs (e.g. 10001).
If you forget to specify numeric reporting values during the survey build, select the option to Automatically increment labeled values numerically for questions with non-numeric reporting values. This will assign numeric values, starting with 1, for each question that has non-numeric reporting values and exports as labeled values.
Use Alias Names
Each of these best practices are optional but the use of the Alias Name, not to be confused with SPSS Variable Names, is the least common customization for SPSS exports. Alias Names are used most often in scripting, but they are useful for SPSS exports too. The Alias Name will be used in the Variable Label field in SPSS. This field is not as commonly used in SPSS. Though, if you are sharing your data set with colleagues who are not familiar with your project having this additional information can be beneficial. The Variable Label will pull the question title if the Alias Name field is left blank.
One must enter the Alias manually on the SPSS general tab when exporting as this field will not auto populate.
Alias Names can also be defined on the Logic tab during question build or on the General tab in the SPSS export. Below is some helpful information on how aliases are represented in SPSS:
- Question Alias (Build) = Variable Label (SPSS Export)
- SPSS Variable Name (Build) = Variable (SPSS Export)
- Reporting Value (Build) = SPSS Variable Type (SPSS Export)
Understanding SPSS Variable Types
When you create a SPSS Export the SPSS Variable Type will be set by default. In most cases you will not need to fiddle with this in order for your data to export to SPSS properly. Below is the list of SPSS Variable Types, the question types that use that variable type and the corresponding Variable Type in SPSS.
SurveyGizmo SPSS Variable Type | Default SurveyGizmo Question Types | SPSS Variable Type |
---|---|---|
String (100) | Textboxes | String |
String (255) | "Other" Textboxes | String |
Labeled Values* | Radio Buttons, Radio Button Grid Rows and other single select questions | Numeric |
Checked/Unchecked | Checkboxes and Checkbox Grid Rows | Numeric |
Essay | Essay | String |
Number | Ranking Grid, Drag & Drop Rank | Numeric |
Whole Number | Textbox with whole number validation | Numeric |
Date | Date | Date |
Dollar | Textbox with currency validation | Dollar |
*SurveyGizmo includes descriptive value labels (answer options) for each value (reporting value) of a variable. Learn about SPSS Value Labels.
How do I export to SPSS?
Easy! Your SPSS export is available with all your other export options via the Results tab.
- Go to Results > Exports and click SPSS.
- On the General tab choose which questions you would like to include by selecting the checkbox in the Active column. Remove items by deselecting this checkbox.
- Check for duplicate Variables and customize your Variable, Variable Label, and SPSS Variable Type, if needed. Note: The general tab only shows 500 variables per page. Scroll to the bottom of the General tab to navigate to later pages to customize variables 500+.
- Click Save & Run.
- Click Download Export and Unzip the .sav file.
Compatibility
- Comments are not available in SPSS exports.
- The Conjoint question is not available in SPSS exports.
- "Other, Write-In" rows in grid questions as not available in SPSS exports.
- The Time Started field is not includes as part of the SPSS export.
FAQ & Troubleshooting
I have foreign characters in my survey, and they're not showing up properly in my SPSS export - why is this happening?
Special characters will not work in the normal data file. You will need to run the Syntax file (.SPS) to decode them.
To open your file with the correct characters, you need to set your syntax to unicode and then run the included data file. Depending on your version you can do both of these things using a point and click method or manually. SPSS Version 14 and below does not support unicode.
To do so, open your syntax file (the .SPS file) and make sure at the top it says SET UNICODE=ON
Then run the syntax file using the .TXT file included in SPSS download folder. Make sure the /FILE="/Users/SGCustomerService/Downloads/SpssExport/spss.txt" is correctly pointing to the .TXT file.
Now click run to run your data. This should open your data in unicode with all the correct characters.
Is there a free program for unzipping my export?
If you are on a Windows computer, we recommend using a program called CAM UnZip: http://www.camunzip.com/download.htm
If you are on a Mac computer, we recommend a program called iZip: http://www.izip.com/
Need more help opening your zip file? Check out our Opening a .zip File Tutorial.
My zip file is empty - what gives?
This is likely the result of invalid characters in variable names. Variables that start with numbers, for instance. Double check your variable names for invalid characters. Reserved keywords cannot be used as SPSS variable names: ALL, AND, BY, EQ, GE, GT, LE, LT, NE, NOT, OR, TO, and WITH.
Please refer to the SPSS Documentation for further information regarding variable name limitations.
I cannot unzip my data file - why is this happening?
This is typically the result of duplicate variable names which corrupts the data file. This can also be caused by very long variable names (over 255 characters). Double check your variable names for duplicates and to ensure that they are not too lengthy (255 characters) re-run the download and you should be all set!
On the Settings tab of my SPSS Export, there is an option to "Enable show, unanswered questions to be distinguished from unshown questions" that is checked by default. What is this? What does it do?
When this option is checked each option in your checkbox questions will receive one of three values, 0 for unchecked, 1 for checked, and null or blank for unseen. If this option is unchecked, checkbox questions that were unseen by the respondent (hidden) will be counted as unanswered (meaning it will be marked with a 0). We recommend leaving this option checked to prevent interpreting unseen checkboxes as unchecked.
What does the "Hide disabled answer options" setting do?
This setting is enabled by default and will remove any disabled answer options from your SPSS Export. If you want to include your disabled answer options, un-check this setting.
I have numeric reporting values defined but I am still getting option SKUs in my data file - what gives?
More often than not this is due to trailing blanks which are not stripped in our system so that the value is interpreted as a string value triggering the use of option SKUs.
I want to use really long reporting values, how many characters can my reporting values use?
We've found that the upper limit of reporting values for SPSS is 64 characters. Keep yours under 64 and you should be good to go!
— Mike.cordeiro on 05/14/2020
@Sue: Thank you so much for reaching out to SurveyGizmo Help!
Regrettably the format of date is stagnant where it will have to be in DD/MM/YYYY. I will certainly pass this feedback on to our teams to see what can be done to make this more malleable in the future. While the format of date as a whole can be changed by navigating to Account > Summary > Account Defaults, this does not appear to apply to SPSS in my tests.
Best,
Mike
Technical Writer
SurveyGizmo Learning and Development
— Survey on 05/13/2020
On SPSS Exports the Date Submitted is in DD/MM/YYYY format. After downloading the file and changing the spss.txt to spss.csv I am unable to change the date format to MM/DD/YYYY. Is there a place in Gizmo that I can change the Date format to reflect MM/DD/YYYY?
Admin
— Bri Hillmer on 02/23/2018
@Seungho: The student license does include the SPSS export. You'll need to create a Market Research trial with a verified student email address. SurveyGizmo verifies the provided email against a third-party library. Assuming that you have created a SurveyGizmo account with a verified student email address, you will see the Annual Student Educational License option available. Select this option to proceed with a student account - you will automatically advance to the Payment Information screen.
Alternatively, you can open a CSV file in SPSS by following these instructions:
https://help.surveygizmo.com/help/how-to-open-a-csv-file-in-spss
I hope this helps!
Bri Hillmer
Documentation Coordinator
SurveyGizmo Customer Experience Team
— Seungho on 02/23/2018
Hi Gizmo team!
I am trying to get a right subscription from SurveyGizmo.eu, and was wondering if I could get the SPSS output from a Basic account (288 €). What I need is having direct SPSS output for each individual respondent (not aggregate) for a Drag & Drop Ranking questions.
If the basic account doesn't allow that, I can consider the Student Educational license do (420€), too.
Thanks!!
Best, Seungho
Admin
— Dave Domagalski on 02/22/2018
@Yehonatan: Thank you for your question!
I'm afraid that there is not currently a way to change the name of the .sav file when exporting to SPSS.
I will note that as a potential future enhancement with our Development Team.
I'm sorry for the trouble!
David
Documentation Specialist
SurveyGizmo Customer Experience
— Yehonatan on 02/22/2018
hey gizmo team!
is thre a way to change the file names inside the zip file?
we have several files we export everyday, and i'd like them to have different names, rather than have them all be called 'spss.sav'.
thanks!
Admin
— Dave Domagalski on 12/19/2016
@Mskarywong: Thank you for exploring SurveyGizmo Documentation!
I'm afraid the SPSS Export feature is not available in the Basic Plan. This feature requires either a Pro or Team Edition plan.
I hope this helps clarify.
David
Documentation Specialist/Survey Explorer
SurveyGizmo Customer Experience
— Mskarywong on 12/19/2016
Hello! Is this function available to basic plan?
Admin
— Bri Hillmer on 10/17/2016
@Craig: We do not have a way to achieve what you describe with our built-in features. Fortunately, the syntax in SPSS should be pretty straightforward in order to achieve this.
Alternatively, our programming services team could get this going for you using scripting. Here is more information on this service:
https://www.surveygizmo.com/programming-services/
I hope this helps!
Bri
Documentation Coordinator/Survey Sorceress
SurveyGizmo Customer Experience Team
— Craig on 10/17/2016
Hello, I am creating a survey which involves logic, so some people taking the survey will not answer certain questions based on their earlier responses. However, after downloading a spreadsheet I have seen that the cells for any question that was not answered because of logic has been left blank in the spreadsheet. Is there a way to set it to be a certain code? so that when downloading it into SPSS I can then define this code as a missing variable? Thanks.
Admin
— Bri Hillmer on 01/29/2016
@Ranjana: You can absolutely do this after collecting data! Great question!
Bri
Documentation Coordinator/Survey Sorceress
SurveyGizmo Customer Support
— Ranjana on 01/28/2016
Can you edit the survey items with SPSS variable names and values after the participants have responded but prior to exporting it to SPSS?
Admin
— Bri Hillmer on 12/15/2015
@Ulrik: You can include disqualified responses on the Filter tab of your SPSS export. I've included the below tutorial that covers filtering reports in general to assist you in finding the option:
help.surveygizmo.com/help/article/link/filter-report-data
I hope this helps!
Bri
Documentation Coordinator/Survey Sorceress
SurveyGizmo Customer Support
— Ulrik on 12/15/2015
I would like to export all my answers from a survey to SPSS, including the disqualified answers, how do I do that?
Admin
— Bri Hillmer on 08/05/2015
@Karen: Changing reporting values after data is collected is generally ok. Here and there we run into a problem where a handful of values do not change but we can generally fix this up. I would recommend instead using the the feature you mentioned "Automatically increment labeled values numerically for questions with non-numeric reporting values" which is available on the Settings tab of your SPSS export.
I hope this helps!
Bri
Documentation Coordinator/Survey Sorceress
SurveyGizmo Customer Support
— Karen Skøien on 08/05/2015
Hi! I have designed a survey and collected all the answers, but I accidentally forgot to enter numeric reporting values to some of my questions! Can I go back and add numeric reporting values to the questions now, or does that destroy the already collected data? And if so, where do I find the the option to "Automatically increment labeled values numerically for questions with non-numeric reporting values"? Thank you in advance!
Admin
— Bri Hillmer on 06/01/2015
@Whitney: Thanks for your feedback! These are both great ideas! I will make note of this for discussion for future improvements with our development team!
Bri
Documentation Coordinator/Survey Sorceress
SurveyGizmo Customer Support
— Whitney Thurman on 05/31/2015
It would be very helpful if before trying to export, any potential errors in variable naming (ie starting with a number, too many characters, etc) were flagged. Also, I hope that eventually, custom variable names can be added to piped questions. That can get to be a lot to type and re-type each export.