Which is the best statistical program for data analysis R or SPSS, please share your opinion. Thanks
R is free, open source and includes thousands of packages inside. SPSS is easy to use, doesn't require experience on programming.
that's true. Besides this thousands of Researchers all over the world are working with R and develop new Routines or implement the latest statistical techniques. so it's always up to date.
but: for the average user (i am one of those too) spss (or similar products) is sufficient most of the time (except for those situations when you Need Special methods like robust statistics etc.). so if you have free Access to spss or a similar product this will be ok. to buy it will cost a lot...
R is especially useful for non-linear multivariate analysis where you need to express a dependent variable(s) in terms of several input independent variables. Simple command line syntax can be re-used making subtle changes, and plotting the results thereof.
spss is easier to handle because it has a standard microsoft windows look & feel. of course you need to know the underlying statistical procedures (you have to know that in any program) but besides this spss is quite easy to handle for the standard analytical techniques. another advantage is that handling of variables and data is very easy and there are really a lot of textbooks for spss, from the very beginning level to the advanced level. for R there are not so much textbooks, you have to check the internet for diverse sources and tutorials. there are also graphical user interfaces for R, which make dealing with data easier, but the advanced statistical procedures are not yet implemented in those GUI.
you may check out the textbooks of andy field. he has written a good one for spss and the same for R, so you can directly compare the 2 programs.
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