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Analytics | Data Visualization | Learn SAS

Rick WicklinOctober 4, 2017 1

Create and interpret a weighted histogram

If you perform a weighted statistical analysis, it can be useful to produce a statistical graph that also incorporates the weights. This article shows how to construct and interpret a weighted histogram in SAS. How to construct a weighted histogram Before constructing a weighted histogram, let's review the construction of

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Analytics | Learn SAS

Visualization of regression that uses a weight variable in SAS

Rick WicklinOctober 2, 2017 61

How to understand weight variables in statistical analyses

How can you specify weights for a statistical analysis? Hmmm, that's a "weighty" question! Many people on discussion forums ask "What is a weight variable?" and "How do you choose a weight for each observation?" This article gives a brief overview of weight variables in statistics and includes examples of

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Analytics | Programming Tips

Rick WicklinSeptember 25, 2017 6

Simulate multivariate normal data in SAS by using PROC SIMNORMAL

My article about Fisher's transformation of the Pearson correlation contained a simulation. The simulation uses the RANDNORMAL function in SAS/IML software to simulate multivariate normal data. If you are a SAS programmer who does not have access to SAS/IML software, you can use the SIMNORMAL procedure in SAS/STAT software to

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Analytics | Learn SAS

Rick WicklinSeptember 20, 2017 17

Fisher's transformation of the correlation coefficient

Pearson's correlation measures the linear association between two variables. Because the correlation is bounded between [-1, 1], the sampling distribution for highly correlated variables is highly skewed. Even for bivariate normal data, the skewness makes it challenging to estimate confidence intervals for the correlation, to run one-sample hypothesis tests ("Is

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Analytics | Programming Tips

Rick WicklinSeptember 11, 2017 1

Symbolic derivatives in SAS

Did you know that you can get SAS to compute symbolic (analytical) derivatives of simple functions, including applying the product rule, quotient rule, and chain rule? SAS can form the symbolic derivatives of single-variable functions and partial derivatives of multivariable functions. Furthermore, the derivatives are output in a form that

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Analytics

Rick WicklinSeptember 5, 2017 4

7 ways to view correlation

Correlation is a fundamental statistical concept that measures the linear association between two variables. There are multiple ways to think about correlation: geometrically, algebraically, with matrices, with vectors, with regression, and more. To paraphrase the great songwriter Paul Simon, there must be 50 ways to view your correlation! But don't

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Analytics | Data Visualization

Bar chart of pairwise correlations between variables

Rick WicklinAugust 16, 2017 2

Use a bar chart to visualize pairwise correlations

Visualizing the correlations between variables often provides insight into the relationships between variables. I've previously written about how to use a heat map to visualize a correlation matrix in SAS/IML, and Chris Hemedinger showed how to use Base SAS to visualize correlations between variables. Recently a SAS programmer asked how

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Analytics | Learn SAS

Rick WicklinAugust 14, 2017 7

What is rank correlation?

When someone refers to the correlation between two variables, they are probably referring to the Pearson correlation, which is the standard statistic that is taught in elementary statistics courses. Elementary courses do not usually mention that there are other measures of correlation. Why would anyone want a different estimate of

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Analytics

Rick WicklinJuly 19, 2017 1

A quantile definition for skewness

Skewness is a measure of the asymmetry of a univariate distribution. I have previously shown how to compute the skewness for data distributions in SAS. The previous article computes Pearson's definition of skewness, which is based on the standardized third central moment of the data. Moment-based statistics are sensitive to

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Analytics | Programming Tips

Rick WicklinJuly 5, 2017 7

Test for the equality of two proportions in SAS

A SAS customer asked how to use SAS to conduct a Z test for the equality of two proportions. He was directed to the SAS Usage Note "Testing the equality of two or more proportions from independent samples." The note says to "specify the CHISQ option in the TABLES statement

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