SPSS Freqently Asked Questions

SPSS is a statistical software application used by William James College students and faculty to manage data, perform statistical analyses, and generate reports for coursework, dissertations, and research projects.

If you need SPSS for a statistics course or your doctoral research project, William James College can provide a 6-month license at no cost.

To request a license code and installation instructions, please contact Support@williamjames.edu.

These are some of the common issues that we see with SPSS, typically when students or faculty are using a Mac along with a few different troubleshooting options.

SPSS opens but doesn’t see or open files when you click on them.

• System Preferences -> Security & Privacy -> Privacy -> Full Disk Access
• Allow changes with user’s credentials -> click the Plus sign -> type Command-shift-G
• /bin-> scroll to find “Sh” and open (make sure it’s checked after the fact) 

Your Mac/SPSS will now see the files and allow them to be opened

SPSS Statistics License Authorization Wizard not accepting the license code

First, make sure that the most up-to-date version of SPSS is the only version installed on your computer. If multiple versions of SPSS are installed, the license code may not be accepted.

If only the current version is installed and the license code is still not being accepted, try the following:

• Open Finder.
• Go to the Applications folder and locate IBM SPSS Statistics.
• Right-click SPSS and select:
  • Show Package Contents → Contents → bin
• Locate and open the file echoid.dat using TextEdit.
• Change the value in the file to: 0x004
• Save the file.
• Re-launch the SPSS Statistics License Authorization Wizard and try entering the license code again.