Dividing a row in a table by its first entry which results in a new column with a 1*1 table in each row. How can i change it to the number?

Hi,

I want to normalize my row by dividing it by its first entry. Which I'm doing in the following way.

D1990.pricenorm = D1990(:,"priceadj")./D1990(1,"priceadj");

Where D1990 is the table, pricenorm the new column and priceadj the column I want to normalize.

My code gives me the right result but stores it as 1*1 table instead of just the number. I attached a picture to be clear what I mean.

How can I fix it? Thank you in advance.

Answer 1

[Dyuman Joshi]

As I don't have your data, I'm using random data -

LastName = {'Sanchez';'Johnson';'Li';'Diaz';'Brown'};
Age = [38;43;38;40;49];
Smoker = logical([1;0;1;0;1]);
Height = [71;69;64;67;64];
Weight = [176;163;131;133;119];
BloodPressure = [124 93; 109 77; 125 83; 117 75; 122 80];

T = table(LastName,Age,Smoker,Height,Weight,BloodPressure)

T = 5×6 table
     LastName      Age    Smoker    Height    Weight    BloodPressure
    ___________    ___    ______    ______    ______    _____________

    {'Sanchez'}    38     true        71       176       124     93  
    {'Johnson'}    43     false       69       163       109     77  
    {'Li'     }    38     true        64       131       125     83  
    {'Diaz'   }    40     false       67       133       117     75  
    {'Brown'  }    49     true        64       119       122     80  

> Using parenthesis with Column name yields a sub table -

T(:,"Weight")

ans = 5×1 table
    Weight
    ______

     176  
     163  
     131  
     133  
     119  

As you operate on a table, the output you will also be a table.

> Solution - You can use curly brackets

T.BMI = T{:,"Weight"}./T{:,"Height"}.^2

T = 5×7 table
     LastName      Age    Smoker    Height    Weight    BloodPressure      BMI   
    ___________    ___    ______    ______    ______    _____________    ________

    {'Sanchez'}    38     true        71       176       124     93      0.034914
    {'Johnson'}    43     false       69       163       109     77      0.034237
    {'Li'     }    38     true        64       131       125     83      0.031982
    {'Diaz'   }    40     false       67       133       117     75      0.029628
    {'Brown'  }    49     true        64       119       122     80      0.029053

Or dot notation

T.BMI = T.("Weight")./T.("Height").^2

T = 5×7 table
     LastName      Age    Smoker    Height    Weight    BloodPressure      BMI   
    ___________    ___    ______    ______    ______    _____________    ________

    {'Sanchez'}    38     true        71       176       124     93      0.034914
    {'Johnson'}    43     false       69       163       109     77      0.034237
    {'Li'     }    38     true        64       131       125     83      0.031982
    {'Diaz'   }    40     false       67       133       117     75      0.029628
    {'Brown'  }    49     true        64       119       122     80      0.029053

Read more here - Access data in a table

[Luca]

Thank you very much for the fast reply. It works perfectly.

[Dyuman Joshi]

Glad to have helped!