Package: dplyr

Function: arrange()

1. Rearrange the variable names in a data dictionary to match the order of the variables in the corresponding dataset

Review the data (df)

# A tibble: 3 x 7
   p_id score1 score2 score3 demo1 demo2 demo3
  <dbl>  <dbl>  <dbl>  <dbl> <dbl> <dbl> <dbl>
1   123     20     25     32     1     1     0
2   225     15     23     18     0     1     0
3   194     22     24     29     0     1     1

Review the data dictionary

# A tibble: 7 x 2
  var_name label             
  <chr>    <chr>             
1 p_id     Study ID          
2 score1   Score scale 1     
3 demo1    Demographic item 1
4 score2   Score scale 2     
5 demo2    Demographic item 2
6 score3   Score scale 3     
7 demo3    Demographic item 3

First, pull the variable name order from the existing dataset.

Next, reorder var_name according to df_names using dplyr::arrange() and base::match().

dd %>%
  dplyr::arrange(base::match(var_name, df_names))
# A tibble: 7 x 2
  var_name label             
  <chr>    <chr>             
1 p_id     Study ID          
2 score1   Score scale 1     
3 score2   Score scale 2     
4 score3   Score scale 3     
5 demo1    Demographic item 1
6 demo2    Demographic item 2
7 demo3    Demographic item 3

Another option is to use base::factor() and assign levels.

dd %>%
  dplyr::arrange(base::factor(var_name,levels = df_names))

Return to Reorder