Convert binary variable from having int values to string values in r

Question

My dependent variable looks like this:

$ dpnm : int 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 ...

And I want to convert the 1s int "Yes" and the 0s into "No"

I have tried:

default$dpnm <- revalue(default$dpnm , c(1 = "Yes"))
default$dpnm <- revalue(default$dpnm , c(0 = "No"))

Maybe its good to store binary values as a logical vector with TRUE and FALSE. default$dpnm <- default$dpnm == 1 — GKi
– GKi, Commented Oct 11, 2022 at 10:19

SamR · Accepted Answer · 2022-10-11 09:50:20Z

2

In base R you can use boolean indexing:

default$dpnm[default$dpnm==0]  <- "No"
default$dpnm[default$dpnm==1]  <- "Yes"

Depending on what you are doing, it may make more sense to convert it to an ordered factor with labels:

default$dpnm  <- factor(
    default$dpnm, 
    levels = c(0,1), 
    labels = c("No", "Yes"),
    ordered = TRUE
)

answered Oct 11, 2022 at 9:50

SamR

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3 Comments

user2554330 Over a year ago

Your code works, but it looks risky to me, because the first line default$dpnm[default$dpnm==0] <- "No" changes the type of the column to character. That means the second line is comparing a character vector to a number in default$dpnm==1. As it happens, this gives the right answer, but I'd worry there are obscure cases of similar problems where it fails (e.g. because of rounding in the conversion). I'd recommend creating a new intermediate variable rather than modifying the column twice.

SamR Over a year ago

@user2554330 fair point - I think it is OK in a simple case like this but implicit type coercion is certainly worth keeping in mind. I'd be interested if you could find an example where it causes unexpected results.

user2554330 Over a year ago

There probably aren't any such cases, I just like to avoid code that makes me worry :-).

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