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mergespss

SPSS match files results in empty column

I am trying to merge 2 files:

The first (mydata) has the examinees' data, which includes the langauge the examinee took the test (language) and the time it took them to complete the test (examinee_test_time).

In the second file (a table file named languages) gives the total test time (total_test_time) for each langauge.

Here is my syntax to merge the 2 files (after sorting each file):

MATCH FILES
  /FILE=*
 /TABLE=languages
 /BY language.
EXECUTE.

after the merge, the total test time variable is empty in the merged file. What is my error?

Solution

  • There are two simple reasons for this to happen:

    1. your original file "mydata" already contains an empty field called total_test_time and so it doesn't get imported from "languages".
    2. There are no corresponding values of language in the two files. It might seem there are but there are differences because of leading/trailing spaces, invisible charachters or capitalization.

    Please check if any of these reasons applies.