How to copy from one variable to another on SPSS

I have a data set with two parent/carer respondents (main and partner) for each participant (child). For one of the variables, only one respondent has given an answer - usually the main respondent, but in some cases it was the partner respondent. I therefore need to fill in some missing main respondent data with data from the partner respondent.

My data looks roughly like this:

MAIN PARTNER I would like the final var as below:
2 -1 2
1 -1 1
-1 2 2
1 . 1
-9 2 2
-8 1 1
2 . 2
1 . 1
etc.


(-1, -8 and -9 are missing values)

All variables are numeric. Where a response is missing from the main respondent, I would like to fill it in from the partner. I cannot seem to get the DO IF/RECODE commands to work.

Any advice on how to do this in SPSS would be hugely appreciated!

1 Answer
1

More than one way to skin a cat. Depending on your taste, you might create your final variable responder like so:

responder

MISSING VALUES main (-1,-8,-9) .
IF (MISSING(main)) responder=partner .
IF (NOT(MISSING(main))) responder=main .
EXE .


First assign your missing values. Then assign a value to responder based on whether main is missing. Note that MISSING(main) will evaluate true when main has a specified missing value (in this case: -1, -8, or -9) or a system missing value.

responder

main

MISSING(main)

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