StatHap #05: Spring 2005

Stat Happenings #5: Statistics News You Can Use
From the Office of Statistical Consulting
Spring 2005

1. Two New Workshops Among On-Campus Offerings
2. Off-Campus Workshops
3. Please plan ahead this spring
4. StatNews Feedback
5. Software updates
6. Recommended Reading and Links
7. Emma Despa
8. New Handouts

1. Two New Workshops Among On-Campus Offerings
Due to popular demand, we will be offering two new workshops this semester in addition to some of our old favorites. The two new workshops will be on "Factor Analysis" and "Interpreting Regression Coefficients." As always, we recommend that you direct any staff, graduate, or undergraduate students working on research for the first time to the Basic Data Analysis Workshop. A session will be offered on March 1 and 3. Please see http://www.human.cornell.edu/Admin/StatCons/workshop.htm for descriptions, schedules, and to register. We would also like to remind you that CISER offers workshops on a number of statistical software programs, including SAS, SPSS, and Stata. See their website for more information: http://www.ciser.cornell.edu/ASPs/workshops.aspx

2. Off-Campus Workshops
We have compiled a listing of statistical workshops happening this spring and summer across the country. They cover many topics of interest to researchers. They cover topics as diverse as "Intro to Stata" and "Mixed Models for Categorical Data." Most are one day to one week long. Please take a look at http://www.human.cornell.edu/Admin/StatCons/workshops/summer2005.htm

3. Please plan ahead this spring
Spring is our busiest time, as many people are focused on finishing research projects during this time. The office becomes busy toward the end of February, so please plan ahead if you would like statistical help this semester, especially for complicated questions.

4. StatNews Feedback
We always appreciate and thank you for your response to our newsletters. We received some insightful comments regarding "StatNews #65: Diagnosing Multicollinearity" that indicated that some points in the newsletter needed to be clarified. Accordingly, we have revised the newsletter on our web site. The updated version can be accessed at http://www.human.cornell.edu/Admin/StatCons/statnews/stnews65.htm

5. Software updates
5.1) SPSS 13 for Windows was released at Cornell at the end of November, bringing some long-awaited upgrades. " Accurate parameter estimates and p-values for complex surveys. For years weve been encouraging SPSS users to use Sudaan, Stata, WesVAr, or SAS for their complex survey analysis. With its much improved complex survey module, SPSS now offers the capability to run general linear models and logistic regression for complex surveys, in addition to descriptive statistics. This module is included in the Cornell site license. " Improved graphing capabilities. The graphing module has been improved over version 12. Improvements include: publication quality bar graphs with error bars, presentation of several graphs for subgroups in a panel, 3-D bar graphs, and a more straightforward method to add separate subgroup regression lines to scatter plots. " Note: Data and Syntax files are back-compatible with SPSS 12, but output files are not. Upgrades are free under the Cornell site license agreement. Please go to www.cit.cornell.edu/software/licenses/spss_download to upgrade.

5.2) Stat/Transfer version 8 for transferring data sets is now available. It supports the latest versions of statistical software, including SPSS 13 and SAS 9, and has expanded capabilities, including longer variable names and the ability to transfer value labels. See http://www.stattransfer.com/html/new.html for more information. It is available for $63 under the current Cornell pricing agreement.

5.3) The latest patch (11.0.3) for SPSS Macintosh has been posted to the SPSS Technical Support Web site. For the latest information on problems resolved with this patch and downloading go to: http://support.spss.com and click on "Login to Support". After entering your login information, select the "Patches" menu and then click on the "SPSS Macintosh Patches" link. 6. Recommended Reading and Links We recommend browsing the statistical resources available at these sites: " Oliver Schabenberger, of SAS Institute, has created a web page with helpful information on analyzing experimental data and using SAS. One example is a page of examples of SAS Proc Mixed and Proc GLM code for various mixed model designs, such as Latin Squares and Split-Split-Plot designs. Go to: http://home.nc.rr.com/schabenb/ " UCLA Academic Technology Services has an extensive network of web pages on statistical computing. It includes tutorials and online workshops on beginning and advanced topics in using SAS, Stata, SPSS, and S-Plus as well as downloadable handouts on many statistical topics. http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/overview.htm

7. Emma Despa
We are pleased to announce that Simona Despa, one of our consultants, gave birth to a girl, Emma Kate, on January 22, 2005. Both mom and baby are doing well. We wish Simona and her husband Misha the best of luck with the new addition to their family. Simona will be back in the office in mid-April.

(This newsletter was distributed to faculty and graduate students in the Division of Nutritional Sciences and the College of Human Ecology, and faculty in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, by the Office of Statistical Consulting. Please forward it to any interested colleagues and research staff. Anyone not receiving this newsletter who would like to be added to the mailing list for future newsletters should contact statcons@cornell.edu. Information about the Office of Statistical Consulting can be obtained at World Wide Web address http://www.human.cornell.edu/admin/statcons/.)