6.1 Loading data

Open the file Sesam.sav:

# Library for reading SPSS files:
library(foreign)
# Load the data and put them in the object called "data"
data <- read.spss("sesam.sav", to.data.frame = TRUE, use.value.labels = FALSE)

This file is part of a larger dataset that evaluates the impact of the first year of the Sesame Street television series. Sesame Street is mainly concerned with teaching preschool related skills to children in the 3-5 year age range.

The following variables will be used in this exercise:

  • age measured in months
  • prelet knowledge of letters before watching Sesame Street (range 0-58)
  • prenumb knowledge of numbers before watching Sesame Street (range 0-54)
  • prerelat knowledge of relations before watching Sesame Street (range 0-17)
  • peabody vocabulary maturity before watching Sesame Street (range 20-120)
  • postnumb knowledge of numbers after a year of Sesame Street (range 0-54)