Statistics included in the base software: The original SPSS manual (Nie, Bent & Hull, 1970) has been described as one of “sociology’s most influential books” for allowing ordinary researchers to do their own statistical analysis. In addition to statistical analysis, data management (case selection, file reshaping, creating derived data) and data documentation (a metadata dictionary was stored in the datafile) are features of the base software. It is also used by market researchers, health researchers, survey companies, government, education researchers, marketing organizations, data miners, and others.
SPSS is a widely used program for statistical analysis in social science. Companion products in the same family are used for survey authoring and deployment (IBM SPSS Data Collection), data mining (IBM SPSS Modeler), text analytics, and collaboration and deployment (batch and automated scoring services). The software name originally stood for Statistical Package for the Social Sciences ( SPSS), reflecting the original market, although the software is now popular in other fields as well, including the health sciences and marketing. The current versions (2015) are officially named IBM SPSS Statistics. Long produced by SPSS Inc., it was acquired by IBM in 2009. SPSS Statistics is a software package used for logical batched and non-batched statistical analysis. Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 16