| quantcut {gtools} | R Documentation |
Create a factor variable using the quantiles of a continous variable.
quantcut(x, q=seq(0,1,by=0.25), na.rm=TRUE, ...)
x |
Continous variable. |
q |
Vector of quantiles used for creating groups. Defaults to
seq(0, 1, by=0.25). See quantile for details. |
na.rm |
Boolean indicating whether missing values should be removed when computing quantiles. Defaults to TRUE. |
... |
Optional arguments passed to cut. |
This function uses quantile to obtain the specified
quantiles of x, then calls cut to create a factor
variable using the intervals specified by these quantiles.
It properly handles cases where more than one quantile obtains the same value, as in the second example below. Note that in this case, there will be fewer generated factor levels than the specified number of quantile intervals.
Factor variable with one level for each quantile interval given by q.
Gregory R. Warnes greg@random-technologies-llc.com
## create example data
x <- rnorm(1000)
## cut into quartiles
quartiles <- quantcut( x )
table(quartiles)
## cut into deciles
deciles <- quantcut( x, seq(0,1,by=0.1) )
table(deciles)
## show handling of 'tied' quantiles.
x <- round(x) # discretize to create ties
stem(x) # display the ties
deciles <- quantcut( x, seq(0,1,by=0.1) )
table(deciles) # note that there are only 5 groups (not 10)
# due to duplicates