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Example of Using a Proportional Font in a Table

You know that type fonts differ in styles. One of their major differences is whether the letters are spaced in proportion to their width or spaced equally in according to a single (or mono) width choice.

The SPSS output that you see on the UNIX screen is formatted using a mono spaced font, which allows all the numbers to line up properly. (That is, so a "1" takes up the same space as a "5".

However, most word processing programs, by default, use a proportionally-spaced font, such as Times or Helvetica. If you simply paste your SPSS output into your word processor without changing your font, you'll usually see something like:

 
DISCUSS  v03 Do you DISCUSS POLITICS often?  by  GENDER  v62 GENDER
Controlling for..
NATION  v01 NATION  Value = 1  United States
               
                    GENDER       Page 1 of 1
            Count  |
           Col Pct |Male     Female
                   |                    Row
                   |     1  |     2  | Total
DISCUSS    --------+--------+--------+
                1  |   161  |   101  |   262
  Frequently       |  17.4  |  11.7  |  14.7
                   +--------+--------+
                2  |   542  |   485  |  1027
  Occasionally     |  58.7  |  56.5  |  57.6
                   +--------+--------+
                3  |   221  |   273  |   494
  Never            |  23.9  |  31.8  |  27.7
                   +--------+--------+
            Column     924      859     1783
                            Total    51.8     48.2    100.0


To see the output so that it resembles what you see on the UNIX screen, you'll need to change from the default font to a monospaced font, of which Courier is the best choice and 10 point the best size.

If you do that, the table above will look like this:

 
DISCUSS  v03 Do you DISCUSS POLITICS often?  by  GENDER  v62 GENDER
Controlling for..
NATION  v01 NATION  Value = 1  United States
               
                    GENDER       Page 1 of 1
            Count  |
           Col Pct |Male     Female
                   |                    Row
                   |     1  |     2  | Total
DISCUSS    --------+--------+--------+
                1  |   161  |   101  |   262
  Frequently       |  17.4  |  11.7  |  14.7
                   +--------+--------+
                2  |   542  |   485  |  1027
  Occasionally     |  58.7  |  56.5  |  57.6
                   +--------+--------+
                3  |   221  |   273  |   494
  Never            |  23.9  |  31.8  |  27.7
                   +--------+--------+
            Column     924      859     1783
             Total    51.8     48.2    100.0