How can I combine nominal data on SPSS?

Question

I am doing my dissertation about brand recall. I created on spss a variable with the brands that the respondents recalled first (eg: 1 = "Facebook", 2="Instagram" and so on). I also created a variable with the brands that the respondents recalled in second place (1= "Facebook" and so on). I want to combine those two variables into one, in order to have only one variable called "brand recall". However, I don't know how to do it. Basically, when I sent the questionnaire to the respondents they mentioned more than one brand in their answers. I don't know how to combine all those answers into one in spss.

Answer 1

You can't do this because you will alter the data. From what I read you have a ranking question or a multiple answear question. The first variables is for the FIRST brand recalled The second variables if for the SECOND brand recalled.

Imagine that you want the answer gave in second variable aka second brand to be moved in the first variable. How will you make difference what was the first brand recalled and second brand recalled.

Another thing. If a respondent selected Facebook as first brand(in the first variable) in the second option Facebook was showed/you have the possibility to select it again? If that's the case this is not ok. Imagine that I can select Facebook in first brand recalled and also in the second one.

Give more details and maybe I can help you

Answer 2

Well if it's an open-ended question you can do a basic coding of that OE question and it goes like this:

1.run a basic frequency of the open-end question. example: fre [Open-end question].

2.after you see what answers you have like Facebook, Twitter etc. will have an overview of what brands were mentioned.

3. Create a numeric variable named brands. example: numeric brands (f2.0) assuming that you have more than 10 individual brands mentioned in the open-end. In case you have more than 100 brands mentioned write (f3.0).

4. Add value labels for the newly created brands variable. example: value labels brands 1"Facebook" 2"Instagram" 3"Twitter" 4"[Any other brands mentioned".(very important to have . at the last value label code added)

5. after you created the variable and added all the brands as value labels/answear options the recode part start:

if [Open-end question]="the exact wording" brands=[select what answear option]. exe.

Example: if [open-end question]="IG" brands=2. Respondent referred to Instagram. if [open-end question]="Faaacebook" brands=1. Respondent referred to Facebook. . . . exe. (do not forget to add at the end .exe in order to run the syntax code)

6. After you populated the brand variable run a simple frequency to see how many mentions you have.

Hope this answers helps.