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Geom - Histogram Ggplot2 Geom - Histogram : # Library

The document provides examples of creating histograms with ggplot2 and base R. It demonstrates how to: 1. Create a basic histogram with ggplot2 using geom_histogram(). 2. Control the bin size/width with the binwidth argument in geom_histogram(). 3. Plot multiple histograms on the same axis or use small multiples with facets. 4. Add elements like boxplots or color portions of the histogram.

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Luis Emilio
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48 views9 pages

Geom - Histogram Ggplot2 Geom - Histogram : # Library

The document provides examples of creating histograms with ggplot2 and base R. It demonstrates how to: 1. Create a basic histogram with ggplot2 using geom_histogram(). 2. Control the bin size/width with the binwidth argument in geom_histogram(). 3. Plot multiple histograms on the same axis or use small multiples with facets. 4. Add elements like boxplots or color portions of the histogram.

Uploaded by

Luis Emilio
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Basic histogram with ggplot2

Basic histogram with geom_histogram

It is relatively straightforward to build a histogram with ggplot2 thanks to the geom_histogram() function. Only one


numeric variable is needed in the input. Note that a warning message is triggered with this code: we need to take
care of the bin width as explained in the next section.
# library
library(ggplot2)

# dataset:
data=data.frame(value=rnorm(100))

# basic histogram
p <- ggplot(data, aes(x=value)) +
geom_histogram()

#p

Control bin size with binwidth

A histogram takes as input a numeric variable and cuts it into several bins. Playing with the bin size is a very
important step, since its value can have a big impact on the histogram appearance and thus on the message you’re
trying to convey. This concept is explained in depth in data-to-viz.
Ggplot2 makes it a breeze to change the bin size thanks to the binwidth argument of the geom_histogram function.
See below the impact it can have on the output.
# Libraries
library(tidyverse)
library(hrbrthemes)

# Load dataset from github


data <-
read.table("https://raw.githubusercontent.com/holtzy/data_to_viz/master/Example_dataset/1_OneNum.csv",
header=TRUE)
# plot
p <- data %>%
filter( price<300 ) %>%
ggplot( aes(x=price)) +
geom_histogram( binwidth=3, fill="#69b3a2", color="#e9ecef", alpha=0.9) +
ggtitle("Bin size = 3") +
theme_ipsum() +
theme(
plot.title = element_text(size=15)
)
#p

Control bin size with binwidth

A histogram takes as input a numeric variable and cuts it into several bins. Playing with the bin size is a very
important step, since its value can have a big impact on the histogram appearance and thus on the message you’re
trying to convey. This concept is explained in depth in data-to-viz.
Ggplot2 makes it a breeze to change the bin size thanks to the binwidth argument of the geom_histogram function.
See below the impact it can have on the output.
# Libraries
library(tidyverse)
library(hrbrthemes)

# Load dataset from github


data <-
read.table("https://raw.githubusercontent.com/holtzy/data_to_viz/master/Example_dataset/1_OneNum.csv",
header=TRUE)

# plot
p <- data %>%
filter( price<300 ) %>%
ggplot( aes(x=price)) +
geom_histogram( binwidth=3, fill="#69b3a2", color="#e9ecef", alpha=0.9) +
ggtitle("Bin size = 3") +
theme_ipsum() +
theme(
plot.title = element_text(size=15)
)
#p
Several histograms on the same axis

If the number of group or variable you have is relatively low, you can display all of them on the same axis, using a
bit of transparency to make sure you do not hide any data.
Note: with 2 groups, you can also build a mirror histogram
# library
library(ggplot2)
library(dplyr)
library(hrbrthemes)

# Build dataset with different distributions


data <- data.frame(
type = c( rep("variable 1", 1000), rep("variable 2", 1000) ),
value = c( rnorm(1000), rnorm(1000, mean=4) )
)

# Represent it
p <- data %>%
ggplot( aes(x=value, fill=type)) +
geom_histogram( color="#e9ecef", alpha=0.6, position = 'identity') +
scale_fill_manual(values=c("#69b3a2", "#404080")) +
theme_ipsum() +
labs(fill="")

Using small multiple

If the number of group you need to represent is high, drawing them on the same axis often results in
a cluttered and unreadable figure.
A good workaroung is to use small multiple where each group is represented in a fraction of the plot window,
making the figure easy to read. This is pretty easy to build thanks to the facet_wrap() function of ggplot2.
Note: read more about the dataset used in this example here.
# Libraries
library(tidyverse)
library(hrbrthemes)
library(viridis)
library(forcats)

# Load dataset from github


data <- read.table("https://raw.githubusercontent.com/zonination/perceptions/master/probly.csv", header=TRUE,
sep=",")
data <- data %>%
gather(key="text", value="value") %>%
mutate(text = gsub("\\.", " ",text)) %>%
mutate(value = round(as.numeric(value),0))
# plot
p <- data %>%
mutate(text = fct_reorder(text, value)) %>%
ggplot( aes(x=value, color=text, fill=text)) +
geom_histogram(alpha=0.6, binwidth = 5) +
scale_fill_viridis(discrete=TRUE) +
scale_color_viridis(discrete=TRUE) +
theme_ipsum() +
theme(
legend.position="none",
panel.spacing = unit(0.1, "lines"),
strip.text.x = element_text(size = 8)
)+
xlab("") +
ylab("Assigned Probability (%)") +
facet_wrap(~text)

Two Histograms with melt colors


Histogramms are commonly used in data analysis to observe distribution of variables. A common task in data
visualization is to compare the distribution of 2 variables simultaneously.
Here is a tip to plot 2 histograms together (using the add function) with transparency (using the rgb function) to
keep information when shapes overlap.
#Create data
set.seed(1)
Ixos=rnorm(4000 , 120 , 30)
Primadur=rnorm(4000 , 200 , 30)

# First distribution
hist(Ixos, breaks=30, xlim=c(0,300), col=rgb(1,0,0,0.5), xlab="height",
ylab="nbr of plants", main="distribution of height of 2 durum wheat varieties" )

# Second with add=T to plot on top


hist(Primadur, breaks=30, xlim=c(0,300), col=rgb(0,0,1,0.5), add=T)

# Add legend
legend("topright", legend=c("Ixos","Primadur"), col=c(rgb(1,0,0,0.5),
rgb(0,0,1,0.5)), pt.cex=2, pch=15 )

Note: this is how the figure looks like if groups are drawn one beside each other:
par(
mfrow=c(1,2),
mar=c(4,4,1,0)
)
hist(Ixos, breaks=30 , xlim=c(0,300) , col=rgb(1,0,0,0.5) , xlab="height" , ylab="nbr of plants" , main="" )
hist(Primadur, breaks=30 , xlim=c(0,300) , col=rgb(0,0,1,0.5) , xlab="height" , ylab="" , main="")

Boxplot on top of histogram


This example illustrates how to split the plotting window in base R thanks to the layout function. Contrary to
the par(mfrow=...) solution, layout() allows greater control of panel parts.
Here a boxplot is added on top of the histogram, allowing to quickly observe summary statistics of the distribution.

# Create data
my_variable=c(rnorm(1000 , 0 , 2) , rnorm(1000 , 9 , 2))
# Layout to split the screen
layout(mat = matrix(c(1,2),2,1, byrow=TRUE), height = c(1,8))

# Draw the boxplot and the histogram


par(mar=c(0, 3.1, 1.1, 2.1))
boxplot(my_variable , horizontal=TRUE , ylim=c(-10,20), xaxt="n" , col=rgb(0.8,0.8,0,0.5) , frame=F)
par(mar=c(4, 3.1, 1.1, 2.1))
hist(my_variable , breaks=40 , col=rgb(0.2,0.8,0.5,0.5) , border=F , main="" , xlab="value of the variable", xlim=c(-
10,20))

Histogram with colored tail


This example demonstrates how to color parts of the histogram. First of all, the hist function must be called without
plotting the result using the plot=F option. It allows to store the position of each bin in an object (my_hist here).
Those bin borders are now available in the $breaks slot of the object, what allows to build a color vector
using ifelse statements. Finally, this color vector can be used in a plot call.
# Create data
my_variable=rnorm(2000, 0 , 10)

# Calculate histogram, but do not draw it


my_hist=hist(my_variable , breaks=40 , plot=F)

# Color vector
my_color= ifelse(my_hist$breaks < -10, rgb(0.2,0.8,0.5,0.5) , ifelse (my_hist$breaks >=10, "purple",
rgb(0.2,0.2,0.2,0.2) ))

# Final plot
plot(my_hist, col=my_color , border=F , main="" , xlab="value of the variable", xlim=c(-40,40) )

Mirrored histogram in base R


The mirrored histogram allows to compare the distribution of 2 variables.
First split the screen with the par(mfrow()) command. The top histogram needs a xaxt="n" statement to discard its
X axis. For the second one, inverse the values of the ylim argument to flip it upside down. Use
the margin command to adjust the position of the 2 charts.
#Create Data
x1 = rnorm(100)
x2 = rnorm(100)+rep(2,100)
par(mfrow=c(2,1))

#Make the plot


par(mar=c(0,5,3,3))
hist(x1 , main="" , xlim=c(-2,5), ylab="Frequency for x1", xlab="", ylim=c(0,25) , xaxt="n", las=1 , col="slateblue1",
breaks=10)
par(mar=c(5,5,0,3))
hist(x2 , main="" , xlim=c(-2,5), ylab="Frequency for x2", xlab="Value of my variable", ylim=c(25,0) , las=1 ,
col="tomato3" , breaks=10)

Histogram without border

Basically, you just need to add border=F to the hist function to remove the border of histogram bars.
# Create data
my_variable=c(rnorm(1000 , 0 , 2) , rnorm(1000 , 9 , 2))

# Draw the histogram with border=F


hist(my_variable , breaks=40 , col=rgb(0.2,0.8,0.5,0.5) , border=F , main="")

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