Powerpoint question

[Angrist]

I'm in the last stage of my MSc thesis, and now I want to add some graphs to my document.

(I interviewed people about experiences in natural environments. For every experience I asked if it was positive or active, and if it was an inactive or active emotion. Both on Likert-scales of 1-7.)

So now I would like to put both sets of data into one graph. I drew what I want, see the picture below. (Graph A has bars within bars. Graph B has a data set on each axis, with circles indicating how many experiences of that combination there were. The bigger, the more.)

Can it be done? How?
Also: Does that look ok? Or is it too confusing? Would you use both, or just one, or a totally different method?
Thanks!

[KillerGremlin]

Maybe a totally different method. The point of a graph is to represent complicated data in a simple and visually friendly way.

Like in your first graph, having a graph within each bar is kind of confusing, unless you are going for a creative, interactive graph.

Also, why is part of your bar graph representing negative values?

Your second graph isn't as bad, it kind of reminds me of Cattell's personality spectrum:



You're going to need to give me more information. How many people did you interview? How many questions did you ask each person?

Was your Likert Scale like this?:

Strongly Disagree | Disagree | Neutral | Agree | Strongly Agree

[Angrist]

Interviewed 17 people for a total of 38 experiences (some had multiple emotions, in total 50).

I asked:
Was it a positive or negative emotion? On a scale of 1 (very negative) to 7 (very positive)?
Was it inactive or inactive? On a scale of 1 (very inactive) to 7 (very active)?

Of course I asked way way more stuff, but I only want to put this stuff in a graph.

The negative values is only because I think it looks cool. They're negative emotions in nature.

So if I'm going for the second graph, how do I make that in Powerpoint/OpenOffice?
Thanks btw.

[KillerGremlin]

Does Openoffice have some Excel replacement? Sad as it may be I'm an avid Office user. My advice is look for a spreadsheet type program like Microsoft Excel. It's an awesome and powerful tool that can do a ton of things.

I'm not really how best to represent the data you have provided, but it sounds like you have a ton of options.

Personally, I think the easiest way to compare it would be to make 2 Tables. Negative and Positive emotions.

Negative Emotions
---Emotion---|Active
Sadness...........Yes
Depression.......No

Positive Emotions
---Emotion---|Active
Happy...............Yes

You could then make 2 Graphs. Put the emotion on the X-axis. And the Likert Score for how Active that emotion was rated.

This would work best in my opinion because your Likert Scale that decided if the emotion was negative or positive has little graphical meaning.
...........1.................4................7
Very Negative | Neutral | Very Positive

You could even exclude emotions that are "Neutral."


But I'm not sure how your study works. Are you trying to measure how active negative and positive emotions are? Because that is what your data seems to best illustrate.

So yeah, go with 2 bar graphs. Use the Likert Scale data from the Negative/Positive to make 2 groups. Then on the X axis put the emotion, and on the Y axis put the Likert Value.

[KillerGremlin]

And again, the point of a graph is to provide as much data as possible in an easy and useful format.

The ideas for your first two graphs aren't bad, I just think for your study you can go with some simple tables and 2 simple bar graphs.

You really have 2 Groups with different activity levels (on your 1 to 7 scale).

Group 1 = Positive Emotions
Group 2 = Negative Emotions
*Group 3 = Neutral Emotions? (this is up to you, did you have any neutral ones?)

You could still make 4 = 0 and have negative values if you feel compelled. You could make the negative part of the graph Inactive and the positive part Active. And then graph it like that. I'd still stick with two graphs though for ease of understanding the information. But you could revise your second graph with similar axises and it might work.

I'd say do whatever you think works best . And yeah.....graphs in excel is hard. Stick with Excel or a spreadsheet alternative.

[Angrist]

Well, there's a big difference between a slightly positive emotion (caused by... a joke your friend makes), or a very positive emotion (caused by seeing the northern light).

I think I'm going with the second one I suggested. And I'll probably end up making it manually. Writing down the 7x7=49 possible combinations and counting how many of the 50 emotions were a specific combo.

Edit: I did it manually. And then I used the data to Paint a graph draft:



By the way, I have Powerpoint here, so no worries there.