diff --git a/R/KorAPQuery.R b/R/KorAPQuery.R
index f337d4a..7a59ae7 100644
--- a/R/KorAPQuery.R
+++ b/R/KorAPQuery.R
@@ -332,11 +332,18 @@
 #' @param kco \code{\link{KorAPConnection}} object (obtained e.g. from \code{new("KorAPConnection")}
 #' @param query string that contains the corpus query. The query language depends on the \code{ql} parameter. Either \code{query} must be provided or \code{KorAPUrl}.
 #' @param conf.level confidence level of the returned confidence interval (passed throgh \code{\link{ci}}  to \code{\link{prop.test}}).
+#' @param as.alternatives LOGICAL that specifies if the query terms should be treated as alternatives. If \code{as.alternatives} is TRUE, the sum over all query hits, instead of the respective vc token sizes is used as total for the calculation of relative frequencies.
 #' @export
 setMethod("frequencyQuery", "KorAPConnection",
-  function(kco, query, vc = "", conf.level = 0.95, ...) {
-      corpusQuery(kco, query, vc, metadataOnly = TRUE, as.df = TRUE, ...) %>%
-      mutate(tokens=corpusStats(kco, vc=vc, as.df=TRUE)$tokens) %>%
+  function(kco, query, vc = "", conf.level = 0.95, as.alternatives = FALSE, ...) {
+      (if (as.alternatives) {
+        corpusQuery(kco, query, vc, metadataOnly = TRUE, as.df = TRUE, ...) %>%
+        group_by(vc) %>%
+        mutate(total = sum(totalResults))
+      } else {
+        corpusQuery(kco, query, vc, metadataOnly = TRUE, as.df = TRUE, ...) %>%
+        mutate(total = corpusStats(kco, vc=vc, as.df=TRUE)$tokens)
+      } ) %>%
       ci(conf.level = conf.level)
 })
 
diff --git a/R/ci.R b/R/ci.R
index b5d06dc..5410b3b 100644
--- a/R/ci.R
+++ b/R/ci.R
@@ -24,12 +24,12 @@
 #' kco <- new("KorAPConnection", verbose=TRUE)
 #' expand_grid(year=2015:2018, alternatives=c("Hate Speech", "Hatespeech")) %>%
 #'   bind_cols(corpusQuery(kco, .$alternatives, sprintf("pubDate in %d", .$year))) %>%
-#'   mutate(tokens=corpusStats(kco, vc=vc)$tokens) %>%
+#'   mutate(total=corpusStats(kco, vc=vc)$tokens) %>%
 #'   ci() %>%
 #'   ggplot(aes(x=year, y=f, fill=query, color=query, ymin=conf.low, ymax=conf.high)) +
 #'     geom_point() + geom_line() + geom_ribbon(alpha=.3)
 #'
-ci <- function(df, x = totalResults, N = tokens, conf.level = 0.95) {
+ci <- function(df, x = totalResults, N = total, conf.level = 0.95) {
   x <- enquo(x)
   N <- enquo(N)
   df %>%
@@ -42,10 +42,10 @@
 }
 
 ## Mute notes: "Undefined global functions or variables:"
-globalVariables(c("totalResults", "tokens", "estimate", "tst"))
+globalVariables(c("totalResults", "total", "estimate", "tst"))
 
 
-# ci.old <- function(df, x = totalResults, N = tokens, conf.level = 0.95) {
+# ci.old <- function(df, x = totalResults, N = total, conf.level = 0.95) {
 #   x <- deparse(substitute(x))
 #   N <- deparse(substitute(N))
 #   df <- data.frame(df)