Alternatives to Excel to store experimental data [closed]

Question

As a part of my thesis, I collect data from students and I combine their data in a single Excel sheet.

The experiment consists of 200 trials. Every trial gives me three numbers:

• The answer is correct (1) or incorrect (0)
• Participants' rating of their confidence in a 5-point scale
• Reaction time

However, Excel has some weaknesses.

1. I cannot write three numbers in one cell
2. Excel doesn't warn me when I mistakenly change or delete data
3. The formulas become too complex as I just want "average correct answers when confidence is 4 or 5 and Reaction Time is less than 2 seconds"
4. There are too many rows columns

Below you can see an example how I try to handle my data: (notice the dots, in my original file there are hundreds of rows and columns)

So, I was wondering if there are some other good software (for mac os, if possible) for storing data. Or, do most experimental psychologists store their data in Excel, too?

Edit. I am aware of the existance of other stack exchange sites. You can vote to close if you think this problem is off-topic, but please don't post unfriendly comments.

I thought this problem relates to academia more than other "computer science, programming" stack exchange sites because most psychologists in academia encounters this problem, but they handle it very "manually" because they don't have a programming background. I thought there are some user-friendly software for social scientists.

Thanks for your valuable answers.

Answer 1

This answer is assuming you are either interested in or already experienced in entry-level programming.

For the programming language Python, a data structure package called Pandas exists. To use it, you can utilize basic python syntax which is not that hard to learn.

There is also extensive documentation and online help on SE forums available. When coming from Excel, you might want to check out this tutorial.

Disclaimer: I have not used it to a great extent, since I did not have any applications for it, but a coworker of mine uses it on a regular basis, and has grown very fond of it despite not having any previous programming experience.