<p><div><div><div><div data-width="100" data-show-faces="false" data-send="true" data-layout="button_count" data-height="21" data-href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/where-do-z-score-tables-come-from-how-to-make-them-in-r/"></div></div><div></div></div><div></div></div>
<div>
(This article was first published on <strong><a href="https://qualityandinnovation.com/2017/02/02/where-do-z-score-tables-come-from-how-to-make-them-in-r/"> R – Quality and Innovation</a></strong>, and kindly contributed to <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/">R-bloggers)</a> </div>
<p><img sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" data-image-description="" data-orig-file="https://qualityandinnovation.files.wordpress.com/2017/02/z-score-table-icon.jpg" data-orig-size="609,570" data-image-title="z-score-table-icon" class="wp-image-3426" data-comments-opened="1" data-recalc-dims="1" data-attachment-id="3426" data-permalink="https://qualityandinnovation.com/2017/02/02/where-do-z-score-tables-come-from-how-to-make-them-in-r/z-score-table-icon/" alt="z-score-table-icon" data-medium-file="https://i2.wp.com/qualityandinnovation.files.wordpress.com/2017/02/z-score-table-icon.jpg?resize=300%2C281&amp;ssl=1" data-large-file="https://qualityandinnovation.files.wordpress.com/2017/02/z-score-table-icon.jpg?w=609" data-image-meta="{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;1&quot;}" src="https://i2.wp.com/qualityandinnovation.files.wordpress.com/2017/02/z-score-table-icon.jpg?resize=300%2C281&ssl=1">Every student learns how to look up areas under the normal curve using Z-Score tables in their first statistics class. But what is less commonly covered, especially in courses where calculus is not a prerequisite, is where those Z-Score tables come from: by <strong>evaluating the integral</strong> of the equation for the bell-shaped normal curve, usually from -Inf to the z-score of interest. This is the same thing that the R command <span>pnorm</span> does when you provide it with a z-score. <a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1sPsRX_07k06j741RToPGsBjMARXRnJ4QXKZYlh9gM3I/edit?usp=sharing">Here is the slide presentation I put together to explain the use and origin of the Z-Score table</a>, and how it relates to <span>pnorm</span> and <span>qnorm</span> (the command that lets you input an area to find the z-score at which the area to the left is swiped out). It’s free to use under Creative Commons, and is part of the course materials that is available for use with <a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://amzn.to/2kmbNss">this 2015 book</a>.</p>
<p>One of the fun things I did was to make my own z-score table in R. I don’t know why anyone would WANT to do this — they are easy to find in books, and online, and if you know how to use <span>pnorm</span> and <span>qnorm</span>, you don’t need one at all. But, you can, and here’s how.</p>
<p><strong>First, let’s create a z-score table just with left-tail areas.</strong> Using symmetry, we can also use this to get any areas in the <em>right</em> tail, because the area to the left of any -z is the same as any area to the right of any +z. Even though the z-score table contains areas in its cells, our first step is to create a table <em>just</em> of the z-scores that correspond to each cell:</p>
<pre>
c0 &lt;- seq(-3.4,0,.1)
c1 &lt;- seq(-3.41,0,.1)
c2 &lt;- seq(-3.42,0,.1)
c3 &lt;- seq(-3.43,0,.1)
c4 &lt;- seq(-3.44,0,.1)
c5 &lt;- seq(-3.45,0,.1)
c6 &lt;- seq(-3.46,0,.1)
c7 &lt;- seq(-3.47,0,.1)
c8 &lt;- seq(-3.48,0,.1)
c9 &lt;- seq(-3.49,0,.1)
z &lt;- cbind(c0,c1,c2,c3,c4,c5,c6,c7,c8,c9)
z

 c0 c1 c2 c3 c4 c5 c6 c7 c8 c9
 [1,] -3.4 -3.41 -3.42 -3.43 -3.44 -3.45 -3.46 -3.47 -3.48 -3.49
 [2,] -3.3 -3.31 -3.32 -3.33 -3.34 -3.35 -3.36 -3.37 -3.38 -3.39
 [3,] -3.2 -3.21 -3.22 -3.23 -3.24 -3.25 -3.26 -3.27 -3.28 -3.29
 [4,] -3.1 -3.11 -3.12 -3.13 -3.14 -3.15 -3.16 -3.17 -3.18 -3.19
 [5,] -3.0 -3.01 -3.02 -3.03 -3.04 -3.05 -3.06 -3.07 -3.08 -3.09
 [6,] -2.9 -2.91 -2.92 -2.93 -2.94 -2.95 -2.96 -2.97 -2.98 -2.99
 [7,] -2.8 -2.81 -2.82 -2.83 -2.84 -2.85 -2.86 -2.87 -2.88 -2.89
 [8,] -2.7 -2.71 -2.72 -2.73 -2.74 -2.75 -2.76 -2.77 -2.78 -2.79
 [9,] -2.6 -2.61 -2.62 -2.63 -2.64 -2.65 -2.66 -2.67 -2.68 -2.69
[10,] -2.5 -2.51 -2.52 -2.53 -2.54 -2.55 -2.56 -2.57 -2.58 -2.59
[11,] -2.4 -2.41 -2.42 -2.43 -2.44 -2.45 -2.46 -2.47 -2.48 -2.49
[12,] -2.3 -2.31 -2.32 -2.33 -2.34 -2.35 -2.36 -2.37 -2.38 -2.39
[13,] -2.2 -2.21 -2.22 -2.23 -2.24 -2.25 -2.26 -2.27 -2.28 -2.29
[14,] -2.1 -2.11 -2.12 -2.13 -2.14 -2.15 -2.16 -2.17 -2.18 -2.19
[15,] -2.0 -2.01 -2.02 -2.03 -2.04 -2.05 -2.06 -2.07 -2.08 -2.09
[16,] -1.9 -1.91 -1.92 -1.93 -1.94 -1.95 -1.96 -1.97 -1.98 -1.99
[17,] -1.8 -1.81 -1.82 -1.83 -1.84 -1.85 -1.86 -1.87 -1.88 -1.89
[18,] -1.7 -1.71 -1.72 -1.73 -1.74 -1.75 -1.76 -1.77 -1.78 -1.79
[19,] -1.6 -1.61 -1.62 -1.63 -1.64 -1.65 -1.66 -1.67 -1.68 -1.69
[20,] -1.5 -1.51 -1.52 -1.53 -1.54 -1.55 -1.56 -1.57 -1.58 -1.59
[21,] -1.4 -1.41 -1.42 -1.43 -1.44 -1.45 -1.46 -1.47 -1.48 -1.49
[22,] -1.3 -1.31 -1.32 -1.33 -1.34 -1.35 -1.36 -1.37 -1.38 -1.39
[23,] -1.2 -1.21 -1.22 -1.23 -1.24 -1.25 -1.26 -1.27 -1.28 -1.29
[24,] -1.1 -1.11 -1.12 -1.13 -1.14 -1.15 -1.16 -1.17 -1.18 -1.19
[25,] -1.0 -1.01 -1.02 -1.03 -1.04 -1.05 -1.06 -1.07 -1.08 -1.09
[26,] -0.9 -0.91 -0.92 -0.93 -0.94 -0.95 -0.96 -0.97 -0.98 -0.99
[27,] -0.8 -0.81 -0.82 -0.83 -0.84 -0.85 -0.86 -0.87 -0.88 -0.89
[28,] -0.7 -0.71 -0.72 -0.73 -0.74 -0.75 -0.76 -0.77 -0.78 -0.79
[29,] -0.6 -0.61 -0.62 -0.63 -0.64 -0.65 -0.66 -0.67 -0.68 -0.69
[30,] -0.5 -0.51 -0.52 -0.53 -0.54 -0.55 -0.56 -0.57 -0.58 -0.59
[31,] -0.4 -0.41 -0.42 -0.43 -0.44 -0.45 -0.46 -0.47 -0.48 -0.49
[32,] -0.3 -0.31 -0.32 -0.33 -0.34 -0.35 -0.36 -0.37 -0.38 -0.39
[33,] -0.2 -0.21 -0.22 -0.23 -0.24 -0.25 -0.26 -0.27 -0.28 -0.29
[34,] -0.1 -0.11 -0.12 -0.13 -0.14 -0.15 -0.16 -0.17 -0.18 -0.19
[35,] 0.0 -0.01 -0.02 -0.03 -0.04 -0.05 -0.06 -0.07 -0.08 -0.09
</pre>
<p>Now that we have slots for all the z-scores, we can use pnorm to transform all those values into the areas that are swiped out to the left of that z-score. This part is easy, and only takes one line. The remaining three lines format and display the z-score table:</p>
<pre>
zscore.df &lt;- round(pnorm(z),4)
row.names(zscore.df) &lt;- sprintf(&quot;%.2f&quot;, c0)
colnames(zscore.df) &lt;- seq(0,0.09,0.01)
zscore.df

 0 0.01 0.02 0.03 0.04 0.05 0.06 0.07 0.08 0.09
-3.40 0.0003 0.0003 0.0003 0.0003 0.0003 0.0003 0.0003 0.0003 0.0003 0.0002
-3.30 0.0005 0.0005 0.0005 0.0004 0.0004 0.0004 0.0004 0.0004 0.0004 0.0003
-3.20 0.0007 0.0007 0.0006 0.0006 0.0006 0.0006 0.0006 0.0005 0.0005 0.0005
-3.10 0.0010 0.0009 0.0009 0.0009 0.0008 0.0008 0.0008 0.0008 0.0007 0.0007
-3.00 0.0013 0.0013 0.0013 0.0012 0.0012 0.0011 0.0011 0.0011 0.0010 0.0010
-2.90 0.0019 0.0018 0.0018 0.0017 0.0016 0.0016 0.0015 0.0015 0.0014 0.0014
-2.80 0.0026 0.0025 0.0024 0.0023 0.0023 0.0022 0.0021 0.0021 0.0020 0.0019
-2.70 0.0035 0.0034 0.0033 0.0032 0.0031 0.0030 0.0029 0.0028 0.0027 0.0026
-2.60 0.0047 0.0045 0.0044 0.0043 0.0041 0.0040 0.0039 0.0038 0.0037 0.0036
-2.50 0.0062 0.0060 0.0059 0.0057 0.0055 0.0054 0.0052 0.0051 0.0049 0.0048
-2.40 0.0082 0.0080 0.0078 0.0075 0.0073 0.0071 0.0069 0.0068 0.0066 0.0064
-2.30 0.0107 0.0104 0.0102 0.0099 0.0096 0.0094 0.0091 0.0089 0.0087 0.0084
-2.20 0.0139 0.0136 0.0132 0.0129 0.0125 0.0122 0.0119 0.0116 0.0113 0.0110
-2.10 0.0179 0.0174 0.0170 0.0166 0.0162 0.0158 0.0154 0.0150 0.0146 0.0143
-2.00 0.0228 0.0222 0.0217 0.0212 0.0207 0.0202 0.0197 0.0192 0.0188 0.0183
-1.90 0.0287 0.0281 0.0274 0.0268 0.0262 0.0256 0.0250 0.0244 0.0239 0.0233
-1.80 0.0359 0.0351 0.0344 0.0336 0.0329 0.0322 0.0314 0.0307 0.0301 0.0294
-1.70 0.0446 0.0436 0.0427 0.0418 0.0409 0.0401 0.0392 0.0384 0.0375 0.0367
-1.60 0.0548 0.0537 0.0526 0.0516 0.0505 0.0495 0.0485 0.0475 0.0465 0.0455
-1.50 0.0668 0.0655 0.0643 0.0630 0.0618 0.0606 0.0594 0.0582 0.0571 0.0559
-1.40 0.0808 0.0793 0.0778 0.0764 0.0749 0.0735 0.0721 0.0708 0.0694 0.0681
-1.30 0.0968 0.0951 0.0934 0.0918 0.0901 0.0885 0.0869 0.0853 0.0838 0.0823
-1.20 0.1151 0.1131 0.1112 0.1093 0.1075 0.1056 0.1038 0.1020 0.1003 0.0985
-1.10 0.1357 0.1335 0.1314 0.1292 0.1271 0.1251 0.1230 0.1210 0.1190 0.1170
-1.00 0.1587 0.1562 0.1539 0.1515 0.1492 0.1469 0.1446 0.1423 0.1401 0.1379
-0.90 0.1841 0.1814 0.1788 0.1762 0.1736 0.1711 0.1685 0.1660 0.1635 0.1611
-0.80 0.2119 0.2090 0.2061 0.2033 0.2005 0.1977 0.1949 0.1922 0.1894 0.1867
-0.70 0.2420 0.2389 0.2358 0.2327 0.2296 0.2266 0.2236 0.2206 0.2177 0.2148
-0.60 0.2743 0.2709 0.2676 0.2643 0.2611 0.2578 0.2546 0.2514 0.2483 0.2451
-0.50 0.3085 0.3050 0.3015 0.2981 0.2946 0.2912 0.2877 0.2843 0.2810 0.2776
-0.40 0.3446 0.3409 0.3372 0.3336 0.3300 0.3264 0.3228 0.3192 0.3156 0.3121
-0.30 0.3821 0.3783 0.3745 0.3707 0.3669 0.3632 0.3594 0.3557 0.3520 0.3483
-0.20 0.4207 0.4168 0.4129 0.4090 0.4052 0.4013 0.3974 0.3936 0.3897 0.3859
-0.10 0.4602 0.4562 0.4522 0.4483 0.4443 0.4404 0.4364 0.4325 0.4286 0.4247
0.00 0.5000 0.4960 0.4920 0.4880 0.4840 0.4801 0.4761 0.4721 0.4681 0.4641
</pre>
<p>You can also draw a picture to go along with your z-score table, so that people remember which area they are looking up:</p>
<pre>
x &lt;- seq(-4,4,0.1)
y &lt;- dnorm(x)
plot(x,dnorm(x),type=&quot;l&quot;, col=&quot;black&quot;, lwd=3)
abline(v=-1,lwd=3,col=&quot;blue&quot;)
abline(h=0,lwd=3,col=&quot;black&quot;)
polygon(c(x[1:31],rev(x[1:31])), c(rep(0,31),rev(y[1:31])), col=&quot;lightblue&quot;)
</pre>
<p>It looks like this:</p>
<p><img sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" data-image-description="" data-orig-file="https://qualityandinnovation.files.wordpress.com/2017/02/z-score-table-icon-small.jpg" data-orig-size="608,563" data-image-title="z-score-table-icon-small" data-comments-opened="1" class="wp-image-3427" data-recalc-dims="1" data-attachment-id="3427" data-permalink="https://qualityandinnovation.com/2017/02/02/where-do-z-score-tables-come-from-how-to-make-them-in-r/z-score-table-icon-small/" alt="z-score-table-icon-small" data-medium-file="https://i0.wp.com/qualityandinnovation.files.wordpress.com/2017/02/z-score-table-icon-small.jpg?resize=300%2C278&amp;ssl=1" data-large-file="https://qualityandinnovation.files.wordpress.com/2017/02/z-score-table-icon-small.jpg?w=608" data-image-meta="{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;1&quot;}" src="https://i0.wp.com/qualityandinnovation.files.wordpress.com/2017/02/z-score-table-icon-small.jpg?resize=300%2C278&ssl=1"></p>
<p>In the slides, code to produce a giant-tail z-score table is also provided (where the areas are > 50%).</p>
<p> <a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://feeds.wordpress.com/1.0/gocomments/qualityandinnovation.wordpress.com/3425/"><img alt="" src="http://feeds.wordpress.com/1.0/comments/qualityandinnovation.wordpress.com/3425/" border="0"></a> <img alt="" src="https://i1.wp.com/pixel.wp.com/b.gif?resize=1%2C1&ssl=1" border="0" data-recalc-dims="1"></p>
<p>
<div>
<div>To <strong>leave a comment</strong> for the author, please follow the link and comment on their blog: <strong><a href="https://qualityandinnovation.com/2017/02/02/where-do-z-score-tables-come-from-how-to-make-them-in-r/"> R – Quality and Innovation</a></strong>.</div>
<hr>
<a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/">R-bloggers.com</a> offers <strong><a rel="nofollow" href="https://feedburner.google.com/fb/a/mailverify?uri=RBloggers">daily e-mail updates</a></strong> about <a title="The R Project for Statistical Computing" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-project.org/">R</a> news and <a title="R tutorials" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/tutorial">tutorials</a> on topics such as: <a title="Data science" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/data%20science">Data science</a>, <a title="Big Data" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/Big%20Data">Big Data, <a title="R jobs" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-users.com/">R jobs</a>, visualization (<a title="ggplot and ggplot2 tutorials" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/ggplot2">ggplot2</a>, <a title="Boxplots using lattice and ggplot2 tutorials" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/boxplot">Boxplots</a>, <a title="Maps and gis" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/map">maps</a>, <a title="Animation in R" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/animation">animation</a>), programming (<a title="RStudio IDE for R" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/RStudio">RStudio</a>, <a title="Sweave and literate programming" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/sweave">Sweave</a>, <a title="LaTeX in R" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/LaTeX">LaTeX</a>, <a title="SQL and databases" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/SQL">SQL</a>, <a title="Eclipse IDE for R" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/eclipse">Eclipse</a>, <a title="git and github, Version Control System" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/git">git</a>, <a title="Large data in R using Hadoop" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/hadoop">hadoop</a>, <a title="Web Scraping of google, facebook, yahoo, twitter and more using R" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/Web+Scraping">Web Scraping</a>) statistics (<a title="Regressions and ANOVA analysis tutorials" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/regression">regression</a>, <a title="principal component analysis tutorial" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/PCA">PCA</a>, <a title="Time series" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/time+series">time series</a>, <a title="finance trading" rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/search/trading">trading</a>) and more...
<img height="1" alt="" width="1" src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/RBloggers/~4/OqEzgx5ZPo8"></a></div>