--- title: "Exploratory Analysis" author: "Jana Stoilova, Adrian Waddell and Gabriel Becker" date: "`r Sys.Date()`" output: rmarkdown::html_vignette vignette: > %\VignetteIndexEntry{Exploratory Analysis} %\VignetteEncoding{UTF-8} %\VignetteEngine{knitr::rmarkdown} editor_options: chunk_output_type: console --- ```{r, include = FALSE} suggested_dependent_pkgs <- c("dplyr") knitr::opts_chunk$set( collapse = TRUE, comment = "#>", eval = all(vapply( suggested_dependent_pkgs, requireNamespace, logical(1), quietly = TRUE )) ) ``` ```{r, echo=FALSE} knitr::opts_chunk$set(comment = "#") ``` ```{css, echo=FALSE} .reveal .r code { white-space: pre; } ``` ## Introduction In this vignette, we would like to introduce how `qtable()` can be used to easily create cross tabulations for exploratory data analysis. `qtable()` is an extension of `table()` from base R and can do much beyond creating two-way contingency tables. The function has a simple to use interface while internally it builds layouts using the `rtables` framework. ## Getting Started Load packages used in this vignette: ```{r, message=FALSE} library(rtables) library(dplyr) ``` Let's start by seeing what `table()` can do: ```{r} table(ex_adsl$ARM) table(ex_adsl$SEX, ex_adsl$ARM) ``` We can easily recreate the cross-tables above with `qtable()` by specifying a data.frame with variable(s) to tabulate. The `col_vars` and `row_vars` arguments control how to split the data across columns and rows respectively. ```{r} qtable(ex_adsl, col_vars = "ARM") qtable(ex_adsl, col_vars = "ARM", row_vars = "SEX") ``` Aside from the display style, the main difference is that `qtable()` will add (N=xx) in the table header by default. This can be removed with `show_colcounts`. ```{r} qtable(ex_adsl, "ARM", show_colcounts = FALSE) ``` Any variables used as the row or column facets should not have any empty strings (""). This is because non empty values are required as labels when generating the table. The code below will generate an error. ```{r, eval = FALSE} tmp_adsl <- ex_adsl tmp_adsl$new <- rep_len(c("", "A", "B"), nrow(tmp_adsl)) qtable(tmp_adsl, row_vars = "new") ``` ## Nested Tables Providing more than one variable name for the row or column structure in `qtable()` will create a nested table. Arbitrary nesting is supported in each dimension. ```{r} qtable(ex_adsl, row_vars = c("SEX", "STRATA1"), col_vars = c("ARM", "STRATA2")) ``` Note that by default, unobserved factor levels within a facet are not included in the table. This can be modified with `drop_levels`. The code below adds a row of 0s for `STRATA1` level "B" nested under the `SEX` level "UNDIFFERENTIATED". ```{r} qtable( ex_adsl, row_vars = c("SEX", "STRATA1"), col_vars = c("ARM", "STRATA2"), drop_levels = FALSE ) ``` In contrast, `table()` cannot return a nested table. Rather it produces a list of contingency tables when more than two variables are used as inputs. ```{r} table(ex_adsl$SEX, ex_adsl$STRATA1, ex_adsl$ARM, ex_adsl$STRATA2) ``` With some help from `stats::ftable()` the nested structure can be achieved in two steps. ```{r} t1 <- ftable(ex_adsl[, c("SEX", "STRATA1", "ARM", "STRATA2")]) ftable(t1, row.vars = c("SEX", "STRATA1")) ``` ## NA Values So far in all the examples we have seen, we used counts to summarize the data in each table cell as this is the default analysis used by `qtable()`. Internally, a single analysis variable specified by `avar` is used to generate the counts in the table. The default analysis variable is the first variable in `data`. In the case of `ex_adsl` this is "STUDYID". Let's see what happens when we introduce some `NA` values into the analysis variable: ```{r} tmp_adsl <- ex_adsl tmp_adsl[[1]] <- NA_character_ qtable(tmp_adsl, row_vars = "ARM", col_vars = "SEX") ``` The resulting table is showing 0's across all cells because all the values of the analysis variable are `NA`. Keep this behavior in mind when doing quick exploratory analysis using the default counts aggregate function of `qtable`. If this does not suit your purpose, you can either pre-process your data to re-code the `NA` values or use another analysis function. We will see how the latter is done in the [Custom Aggregation] section. ```{r} # Recode NA values tmp_adsl[[1]] <- addNA(tmp_adsl[[1]]) qtable(tmp_adsl, row_vars = "ARM", col_vars = "SEX") ``` In addition, row and column variables should have `NA` levels explicitly labelled as above. If this is not done, the columns and/or rows will not reflect the full data. ```{r} tmp_adsl$new1 <- factor(NA_character_, levels = c("X", "Y", "Z")) qtable(tmp_adsl, row_vars = "ARM", col_vars = "new1") ``` Explicitly labeling the `NA` levels in the column facet adds a column to the table: ```{r} tmp_adsl$new2 <- addNA(tmp_adsl$new1) levels(tmp_adsl$new2)[4] <- "" # NA needs to be a recognizible string qtable(tmp_adsl, row_vars = "ARM", col_vars = "new2") ``` ## Custom Aggregation A powerful feature of `qtable()` is that the user can define the type of function used to summarize the data in each facet. We can specify the type of analysis summary using the `afun` argument: ```{r} qtable(ex_adsl, row_vars = "STRATA2", col_vars = "ARM", avar = "AGE", afun = mean) ``` Note that the analysis variable `AGE` and analysis function name are included in the top right header of the table. If the analysis function returns a vector of 2 or 3 elements, the result is displayed in multi-valued single cells. ```{r} qtable(ex_adsl, row_vars = "STRATA2", col_vars = "ARM", avar = "AGE", afun = range) ``` If you want to use an analysis function with more than 3 summary elements, you can use a list. In this case, the values are displayed in the table as multiple stacked cells within each facet. If the list elements are named, the names are used as row labels. ```{r} fivenum2 <- function(x) { setNames(as.list(fivenum(x)), c("min", "Q1", "MED", "Q3", "max")) } qtable(ex_adsl, row_vars = "STRATA2", col_vars = "ARM", avar = "AGE", afun = fivenum2) ``` More advanced formatting can be controlled with `in_rows()`. See function documentation for more details. ```{r} meansd_range <- function(x) { in_rows( "Mean (sd)" = rcell(c(mean(x), sd(x)), format = "xx.xx (xx.xx)"), "Range" = rcell(range(x), format = "xx - xx") ) } qtable(ex_adsl, row_vars = "STRATA2", col_vars = "ARM", avar = "AGE", afun = meansd_range) ``` ## Marginal Summaries Another feature of `qtable()` is the ability to quickly add marginal summary rows with the `summarize_groups` argument. This summary will add to the table the count of non-NA records of the analysis variable at each level of nesting. For example, compare these two tables: ```{r} qtable( ex_adsl, row_vars = c("STRATA1", "STRATA2"), col_vars = "ARM", avar = "AGE", afun = mean ) qtable( ex_adsl, row_vars = c("STRATA1", "STRATA2"), col_vars = "ARM", summarize_groups = TRUE, avar = "AGE", afun = mean ) ``` In the second table, there are marginal summary rows for each level of the two row facet variables: `STRATA1` and `STRATA2`. The number 18 in the second row gives the count of observations part of `ARM` level "A: Drug X", `STRATA1` level "A", and `STRATA2` level "S1". The percent is calculated as the cell count divided by the column count given in the table header. So we can see that the mean `AGE` of 31.61 in that subgroup is based on 18 subjects which correspond to 13.4% of the subjects in arm "A: Drug X". See `?summarize_row_groups` for how to add marginal summary rows when using the core `rtables` framework. ## Table Decorations Tables generated with `qtable()` can include annotations such as titles, subtitles and footnotes like so: ```{r} qtable( ex_adsl, row_vars = "STRATA2", col_vars = "ARM", title = "Strata 2 Summary", subtitle = paste0("STUDY ", ex_adsl$STUDYID[1]), main_footer = paste0("Date: ", as.character(Sys.Date())) ) ``` ## Summary Here is what we have learned in this vignette: - `qtable()` can replace and extend uses of `table()` and `stats::ftable()` - `qtable()` is useful for exploratory data analysis As the intended use of `qtable()` is for exploratory data analysis, there is limited functionality for building very complex tables. For details on how to get started with the core `rtables` layout functionality see the [`introduction`](https://insightsengineering.github.io/rtables/latest-release/articles/rtables.html) vignette.