This page has now been updated to reflect 2009 HRA data.

HFIT-565

Assessment & Evaluation of Health Fitness Parameters

Fall Semester 2009

Dr. Marc Schaeffer

mschaef@american.edu

Go to Course Syllabus

ASSIGNMENT #1

Additional Problem Details

Part of Assignment #1 includes the the following items A, B, & C. You will see two Excel facsimiles below. The first is the blank Excel array and the second illustrates the data for you to enter, and reflects the results of tabulating the data you supplied in class on the evening 8/27/09. I want you to gain experience downloading an Excel file and also entering your own data. Also, below you will find a brief dictionary for the data set. If you have not read Lecture #1, you will want to do so to be sure that you know what a dictionary is supposed to achieve.

Please do not forget to do the reading and Textbook problems.

Dictionary for Class Data Set

For the problems below use the following dictionary to direct you to the proper variables in the spreadsheet.

If you want to see a copy of the questionnaire you completed to see how these variables correspond (map) to the actual questionnaire items click here (although it is showing a 2004 date, the questionnaire is not materially different).

If you were making up your own data set, you could use different names or spellings for these variables, but since you are using the data template below, you should NOT alter the spellings at all.

A. Download the blank Excel array (it is named BLANK1.XLS)

• 1) enter the data displayed below and make sure that your data set looks EXACTLY the same as the one below before you enter the data, first download BLANK1.XLS - as you will enter directly into this worksheet.
• 2) you must verify your data entry before proceeding - you might consider checking your entry again, if not two more times! (failure to duplicate the data exactly will probably result in errors for all of the part B problems)
• please be sure that you note that the column O headed 'age' is blank in the data display, but you will need to make sure that the cells in this column contain the appropriate value for each case - this is necessary for problem B2

B. Using Excel, calculate the following from the data you supplied in class on Thursday 27 August. Make sure that you display the means for the variables listed below to a single decimal place.

• 1) mean HT all students
• 2) mean age for all students (this variable's values are not yet in the data set and must be calculated by you using Excel; if you did not leave a blank column for Column O (for the variable age), insert or add a new column to your array and make sure that the computational formula is entered into each cell of this new column)
• 3) mean number of PA (physical activity) sessions for all students

C. Supply the type of measurement scale for each of the following.

• 1) SMOKE
• 2) SBELT
• 3) DIA
• 4) TCHOL
• 5) GENDER
• 6) HT
• 7) age

Immediately below you will see our class data blank array with variable names and ID code numbers. This blank array is essentially a template. If you will click on the image of the blank array, it will download to your computer (if you downloaded the file once already, you do not need to do it again). Enter the data as they appear in the next image (under the heading DATA SET FOR FALL 2009 into this blank array.

DATA SET FOR FALL 2009

These are the data for Fall 2009. Use the table below to enter data into your blank sheet that you downloaded above.

During the assignment #1 interval, the display below will be a display only table, but after class on 3 September, I will make this array downloadable in Excel. In other words, you will need to enter your own data, similar to the way it is frequently done in real life and the way I did it to create this nice picture. Further, please forgive me for taking the liberty for entering values for cells that some of you left blank in your questionnaires. It adds another dimension of complexity to deal with missing data, and thus, I have tried to ease some of your burden by supplying values where they were missing.

If you want to ensure that you have the correct data, you can now download these data by clicking anywhere inside the above array. This array will be posted after class on 3 Sep.

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<------ Go back to Lecture 2 Assignments Additional Problems

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this page last modified by M Schaeffer

on Aug 27, 2009