I can't see a strong case for disturbing long-standing
code here.
In essence, when you ask for -row- the row percents
add up to 100 and the row labelled "Total" contains percents
derived from column totals. And that seems
consistent with established tabulation traditions.
I agree that for specific purposes one might want
different wording, but sensible wording is hard
to automate, and far from "All" being a satisfactory
general alternative, it seems no less ambiguous to me.
I suggest that this kind of personal preference problem is best
tackled downstream, say by automating an edit of .smcl output
from a series of tabulations. Or you could look at -tabdisp-
and its options.
Nick
[email protected]
Renzo Comolli
> This is a minor linguistic point that I bring up only because
> it came up so
> many time when people are reading my tables.
> The question is conceptually so obvious that it is even
> difficult to explain
> where the problem arises.
> When you create a two-ways tabulation and you display it as
> percentage of
> rows, of course it does not sum up to 100% by column,
> nonetheless it might
> be human mental laziness that one someone sees the word
> "Total" than he or
> she wants to see it sum up to 100%
> See the example below in which the last line says "Total"
> �
> . use http://www.stata-press.com/data/r8/gss1991.dta
> . tab region sex, row nofreq
> �
> �region of |
> the united |�� respondent's sex
> ��� states |����� male���� female |���� Total
> -----------+----------------------+----------
> north east |���� 41.60����� 58.40 |��� 100.00
> south east |���� 42.82����� 57.18 |��� 100.00
> ����� west |���� 42.14����� 57.86 |��� 100.00
> -----------+----------------------+----------
> ���� Total |���� 42.09 �����57.91 |��� 100.00
> �
> Perhaps it would be better if -tabulate- said "All" in the
> last row when the
> option -,row- is selected.
> e.g.
> �
> region of |
> the united |�� respondent's sex
> ��� states |����� male���� female |���� Total
> -----------+----------------------+----------
> north east |���� 41.60����� 58.40 |��� 100.00
> south east |���� 42.82����� 57.18 |��� 100.00
> ����� west |���� 42.14����� 57.86 |��� 100.00
> -----------+----------------------+----------
> ���� ��All |���� 42.09 �����57.91 |��� 100.00
> �
> This point is very minor and it out more as a curiosum about
> peoples' mind
> than a suggestion for a change in the code.
> Personally, I found useful to put my own description so I
> would write "U.S."
> in this example
>
>
> Of course the same could be said for -tabulate var1 var2,
> column- but for
> inscrutable reasons having to do with the human mind, people
> are not that
> confused -, column- case
*
* For searches and help try:
* http://www.stata.com/support/faqs/res/findit.html
* http://www.stata.com/support/statalist/faq
* http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/stata/
