Statalist The Stata Listserver


[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date index][Thread index]

st: RE: Friends' characteristics


From   "Nick Cox" <[email protected]>
To   <[email protected]>
Subject   st: RE: Friends' characteristics
Date   Thu, 31 Aug 2006 00:12:04 +0100

There is probably a -merge- solution. 

In this case, at worst, a solution is a single 
loop over observations. 

gen gpa_f = .

qui forval i = 1/`=_N' {
	/// next line may wrap 
	su gpa if inlist(id,`=friend1[`i']', `=friend2[`i']', `=friend3[`i']', `=friend4[`i']') , meanonly
	replace gpa_f = r(mean) in `i'
}

If your ids are string, then you need instead 

inlist(id,"`=friend1[`i']'", "`=friend2[`i']'", "`=friend3[`i']'", "`=friend4[`i']'") 

Nick 
[email protected] 

Chris Ruebeck
 
> Suppose my data set has these 6 variables,
> 
> 	id : this respondent's ID,
> 	gpa : this respondent's GPA, and
> 	friend1-4 : the IDs (possibly missing) of this 
> respondent's friends.
> 
> I would like to create four new variables that record the GPA 
> of each  
> respondent's friends, and then take their average.  I have many  
> observations and want to avoid slower methods.  Here is my code for  
> the first friend.
> 
> gen gpaf1 = .
> egen group = group(friend1)
> summarize group, meanonly
> foreach num 1 / `r(max)' {
> 	summarize id if group==`num', meanonly
> 	local idf = r(mean)
> 	summarize gpa if id==`idf', meanonly
> 	replace gpaf1 = r(mean) if group==`num'
> }
> 
> I figure I can nest this in a forvalues loop from 1-4, and then use - 
> egen ... rowmean(gpaf1-4)- to get the mean over friends.  In 
> the code  
> above, levelsof could replace the -egen ... group(friend1)- 
> but macro  
> length limits would require splitting the friends' ids into two to  
> four groups.
> 
> Is there a faster method, perhaps with Mata?
> 
> (An additional wrinkle: some friends may no longer be in the  
> database---so an observation's friend1, for example, may contain a  
> number that is not the id of any observation.  I think the 
> code above  
> is robust to that problem, but perhaps this is another potential  
> speed improvement.)

*
*   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/



© Copyright 1996–2024 StataCorp LLC   |   Terms of use   |   Privacy   |   Contact us   |   What's new   |   Site index