What is the prop.table() function in R?

Overview

The prop.table() function in R creates table entries as fractions of a marginal table.

The prop.table() function shows the individual value as a fraction of the whole. These fractions (the values in the table) sum up to 1.

Syntax

The prop.table() function takes the syntax shown in the code widget below.

prop.table(x, margin=NULL)
Syntax for the prop.table() function in R

Parameter value

The prop.table() function takes the following parameter values:

  • x: This is the R object that will serve as the table. This is a required parameter.
  • margin: This is an index or vector of indices for which the margin is generated. This is an optional parameter.

Return value

The prop.table() function returns a table expressed relative to the margin.

Example

# creating a matrix object

my_matrix <-  matrix (

       c(  1, 3, 1,

           7, 3, 5),

       ncol  = 3,

       byrow = TRUE

)



# implementing the prop.table() function 

prop.table(my_matrix)

Explanation

  • Line 2–7: We create a matrix object my_matrix using the matrix() function.
  • Line 10: Using the prop.table() function, we return a table showing each value as a proportion of the whole value in the table. When these proportions are added, they equal 1.

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