Python - Return Random Value from List

Question

My dataset has three columns: State, Food, and State_New. My goal is to create a forth column but return a random value based on an established list of values. Initially, I was trying to do a vlookup and randbetween function in excel, where my goal was to return a random value from a list, so long as my first criteria matched - but that did not work (it always chose the first value to return).

Below is an example. So, the unique values for State PA are: Pop and Soda, while for CA it is Burger and Fries (the State and Food column link together). The Food_New column should first look at the State_New column, find the same state name in State column, and then randomly pick a value from the Food column.

My actual dataset is quite large with multiple different combinations. I'm not sure if I should use random.choice(list) function or something else.

Input:

State Food   State_New
CA    Burger PA      
CA    Fries  CA       
PA    Soda   CA      
PA    Pop    PA
PA    Soda   PA

Output:

State Food   State_New Food_New
CA    Burger PA        Pop
CA    Fries  CA        Fries
PA    Soda   CA        Fries
PA    Pop    PA        Pop
PA    Soda   PA        Soda

The output (Food_New) column, should potentially change anytime I rerun the code.

Corralien · Accepted Answer · 2021-07-06 22:33:18Z

1

Build the list of Food choices from State and pick a value according the list of Food from State_New:

df['Food_New'] = df['State_New'].map(df.groupby('State')['Food'].unique()) \
                                .apply(np.random.choice)

>>> df
  State    Food State_New Food_New
0    CA  Burger        PA      Pop
1    CA   Fries        CA   Burger
2    PA    Soda        CA    Fries
3    PA     Pop        PA      Pop
4    PA    Soda        PA     Soda

answered Jul 6, 2021 at 22:33

Corralien

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