The suggested data to use with the exercises is the European Social Survey Round 4. Since the
data file is quite large, it is suggested that one uses only a subset of the
data while doing the exercises, for example, only Finnish data. The data files
are available as free downloads from the ESS
website after a quick registration.
How to Obtain a Copy of the Course Data
- Download the Finnish data
- see some documentation
- Go to the European Social Survey homepage.
- Click “New User” on the left-hand navigation bar. Note that the registration form uses faulty code, and the form labels are visible only with Internet Explorer 6.0.
- Fill in the form, and click “Register”.
- Go to ESS round 2 data download page, and select the country data you wish to use on this course from the drop-down list. The default subset is for Finland.
- Download the SPSS file by clicking on the SPSS icon on the country file row.
- At this point, enter the email address you just registered with as your username.
- Save the data to your course folder.
- Next, download the Variables and questions list and the Variable list which you’ll need to familiarize yourself with the survey data.