SPSS® 12.0 Command Syntax Reference

PROXIMITIES 1287
BLWMN[(p[,np])] Binary Lance-and-Williams nonmetric dissimilarity measure. This
measure is also known as the Bray-Curtis nonmetric coefficient. The
range is 0 to 1.
Example
PROXIMITIES A B C
/MEASURE=RR(1,2).
• MEASURE computes Russell and Rao coefficients from data in which 1 indicates the
presence of a characteristic and 2 indicates the absence. Other values are ignored.
Example
PROXIMITIES A B C
/MEASURE=SM(2).
• MEASURE computes simple matching coefficients from data in which 2 indicates presence
and all other values indicate absence.
Transforming Measures in Proximity Matrix
Use keyword NONE to apply the ABSOLUTE, REVERSE, and/or RESCALE transformations
to an existing matrix of proximity values without computing any proximity measures.
NONE Do not compute proximity measures. Use NONE only if you have specified an
existing proximity matrix on keyword IN on the MATRIX subcommand.
PRINT Subcommand
PROXIMITIES always prints the name of the measure it computes and the number of cases.
Use PRINT to control printing of the proximity matrix.
PROXIMITIES Print the matrix of the proximities between items. This is the default. The
matrix may have been either read or computed. When the number of cases or
variables is large, this specification produces a large volume of output and
uses significant CPU time.
NONE Do not print the matrix of proximities.
ID Subcommand
BLWMN( x, y)
b+ c
=
-----------------------
2a+ b+ c
By default, PROXIMITIES identifies cases by case number alone. Use ID to specify an identifying
string variable for cases.
• Any string variable in the working data file can be named as the identifier. PROXIMITIES
uses the first eight characters of this variable to identify cases in the output.