How to Add a Prefix to Variable Names in R (Example Code)

This article explains how to insert a prefix in front of the column names of a data frame in R programming.

Example Data

data(iris)                                                   # Iris data set as example data
head(iris)
#   Sepal.Length Sepal.Width Petal.Length Petal.Width Species
# 1          5.1         3.5          1.4         0.2  setosa
# 2          4.9         3.0          1.4         0.2  setosa
# 3          4.7         3.2          1.3         0.2  setosa
# 4          4.6         3.1          1.5         0.2  setosa
# 5          5.0         3.6          1.4         0.2  setosa
# 6          5.4         3.9          1.7         0.4  setosa

Example: Adding Prefix in Front of Column Names of Data Frame

iris_pref <- iris                                            # Duplicate data
colnames(iris_pref) <- paste0("PREF.", colnames(iris_pref))  # Add prefix
head(iris_pref)                                              # Print updated data
#   PREF.Sepal.Length PREF.Sepal.Width PREF.Petal.Length PREF.Petal.Width PREF.Species
# 1               5.1              3.5               1.4              0.2       setosa
# 2               4.9              3.0               1.4              0.2       setosa
# 3               4.7              3.2               1.3              0.2       setosa
# 4               4.6              3.1               1.5              0.2       setosa
# 5               5.0              3.6               1.4              0.2       setosa
# 6               5.4              3.9               1.7              0.4       setosa

Related Tutorials

Have a look at the following R programming language tutorials. They discuss topics such as matrices, merging, and extracting data:

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Fill out this field
Fill out this field
Please enter a valid email address.
You need to agree with the terms to proceed

Menu
Top