Frequency analysis counts the occurrence of individual data values in columns that contain categorical data. It is useful in understanding the meaning of a particular data element, and points out the need to recode some of the data values found, either permanently or in the course of building an analytic data set. This function can also be useful in analyzing combinations of values occurring in two or more columns.
Given a table name and the name of one or more columns, the Frequency analysis calculates the number of occurrences of each value of the column or columns individually or in combination. Additionally, it lists the percentage of rows in the selected table in descending order starting with the most frequently occurring value.
You can request the following:
- Whether to calculate basic structure (minimum, maximum, mean, standard deviation) on one or more columns.
- Whether to include only frequency values that occur a minimum percentage of the time.
- A WHERE clause, reducing the rows before aggregation.
- A HAVING clause, reducing the answer set after aggregating, which must refer to the requested columns' xcnt or xpct.