Reading A
Table (edited 02/24/08)

Table
Conventions: Creating and Reading a Table (interpreting the
distributions in a table)
Typically
for a computer statistical analysis of survey data, you:
- Create
a table with the independant variable as the column and the dependant
variable as the row with column percentages.
- Read
the marginals, row and column totals:
- Check
the frequency of your independent and dependent variables to
make sure they do indeed vary in your data. In other words ensure
that your data does not fit into two few classifications or even in a
single classification such as all or most of the respondants choosing
"Yes" on the Abortion for any reason question.
- Interpret
the distributions in the table in terms of your hypothesis by comparing
differences across rows.
- Look
at appropriate significance statistics to
determine if your table distributions are significant (are not likely
to have occurred by chance)
- If
the data is appropriate with above configeration, compare diffirences
in means across independant categories
- Create
or read the table footer which should contain specific information
about the data (source, time, etc.)
Table Exercise
HINT:
If your independent variable has too many categories to run across a
page, simply make it the row variable and calculate (row) and compare
percents (column)
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