Search results for "Similarity"

Groups' warmth is a personal matter: Understanding consensus on stereotype dimensions reconciles adversarial models of social evaluation

2020

Abstract As proponents of two theories of social evaluation, we disagree whether people spontaneously differentiate societal groups' conservative-progressive beliefs (distinct claim of the agency-beliefs-communion or ABC model) or warmth/communion (distinct claim of the stereotype content model or SCM). Our adversarial collaboration provides one way to resolve this debate. Examining people from four continents who differentiated groups in their country (N = 2356), we found lower consensus on groups' warmth/communion compared to agency/~competence and beliefs (Studies 1–4). Consensus on groups' warmth/communion was lower because people differed in self-rated agency and beliefs, and they infe…

On Some “family resemblances” of Fuzzy Set Theory and Human Sciences

2011

The aim of this paper is to underline the importance of detecting similarities or at least, ‘family resemblances’ among different fields of investigation. As a matter of fact, the attention will be focused mainly on fuzzy sets and a few features of human sciences; however, I hope that the arguments provided and the general context outlined will show that the problem of picking up (dis)similarities among different disciplines is of a more general interest. Usually strong dichotomies guide out attempts at understanding the paths along which scientific research proceed; i.e., soft versus hard sciences, humanities versus the sciences of nature, Naturwissenschaften versus Geisteswissenschaften, …

Soft Computing Methods for Personnel Selection Based on the Valuation of Competences

2014

Personnel selection based on candidates' competences is a difficult task due to the imprecise description of the applicants' competences and to the existence of several experts simultaneously evaluating those attributes. In this context, fuzzy sets theory provides suitable tools for the attainment of the maximum possible information from imprecise data. In this work, personnel selection methods are proposed that rely on the definition of an ideal candidate. Aggregated fuzzy valuations of each candidate are obtained taking into account the individual valuations provided by the experts. Then, candidates are ranked based on their similarity with the ideal candidate. Three different scenarios a…

Water erosion assessment and modeling in two calanchi areas in Sicily, Italy

I badlands sono forme di erosione localizzate principalmente nelle regioni aride e semi-aride e sono formati da una complessa combinazione di processi morfogenetici. La loro origine coinvolge processi di erosione idrica ma anche tunnel erosion e movimenti di massa. Inoltre, tali forme possono anche essere correlate a fenomeni di erosione accelerata che hanno luogo laddove le azioni antropiche disturbano l'equilibrio naturale tra processi morfogenetici e suolo. I badlands, con i loro versanti ripidi, sono spesso inseriti all’interno di paesaggi più dolci, in mezzo a colture o bosco, localizzati in aree dove i processi responsabili del loro modellamento sono di solito piuttosto attivi determi…

Usage of HMM-Based Speech Recognition Methods for Automated Determination of a Similarity Level Between Languages

2019

The problem of automated determination of language similarity (or even defining of a distance on the space of languages) could be solved in different ways – working with phonetic transcriptions, with speech recordings or both of them. For the recordings, we propose and test a HMM-based one: in the first part of our article we successfully try language detection, afterwards we are trying to calculate distances between HMM-based models, using different metrics and divergences. The Kullback-Leibler divergence is the only one we got good results with – it means that the calculated distances between languages correspond to analytical understanding of similarity between them. Even if it does not …

Morphological Similarity and Ecological Overlap in Two Rotifer Species

2013

Co-occurrence of cryptic species raises theoretically relevant questions regarding their coexistence and ecological similarity. Given their great morphological similitude and close phylogenetic relationship (i.e., niche retention), these species will have similar ecological requirements and are expected to have strong competitive interactions. This raises the problem of finding the mechanisms that may explain the coexistence of cryptic species and challenges the conventional view of coexistence based on niche differentiation. The cryptic species complex of the rotifer Brachionus plicatilis is an excellent model to study these questions and to test hypotheses regarding ecological differentia…

Using Chemical Structural Indicators for Periodic Classification of Local Anaesthetics

2011

Algorithms for classification and taxonomy based on criteria as information entropy and its production are proposed. Some local anaesthetics, currently in use, are classified using five characteristic chemical properties of different portions of their molecules. Many classification algorithms are based on information entropy. When applying the procedures to sets of moderate size, an excessive number of results appear compatible with data and the number suffers a combinatorial explosion. However, after the equipartition conjecture one has a selection criterion between different variants resulting from classification between hierarchical trees. Information entropy and principal component anal…

Effects of morphometric descriptor changes on statistical classification and morphospaces

2004

Ten morphometric descriptors (five pairs of form and shape parameters) are used to describe the complex morphology of the first lower molar of two morphologically similar species, Microtus arvalis and M. agrestis. These descriptors are derived either from linear measurements or from outline analysis. The effects of these different descriptors on classical analysis as used in biology or palaeobiology are explored. First, the reliability of results in statistical classification is assessed. All of the descriptors discriminate well between the two species. The initial morphometric scheme (linear or outline) does not induce marked differences in statistical classification and the major discrepa…

STATIS and DISTATIS: optimum multitable principal component analysis and three way metric multidimensional scaling

2012

STATIS is an extension of principal component analysis PCA tailored to handle multiple data tables that measure sets of variables collected on the same observations, or, alternatively, as in a variant called dual-STATIS, multiple data tables where the same variables are measured on different sets of observations. STATIS proceeds in two steps: First it analyzes the between data table similarity structure and derives from this analysis an optimal set of weights that are used to compute a linear combination of the data tables called the compromise that best represents the information common to the different data tables; Second, the PCA of this compromise gives an optimal map of the observation…

Assessment of the probabilities for evolutionary structural changes in protein folds.

2007

Abstract Motivation: The evolution of protein sequences can be described by a stepwise process, where each step involves changes of a few amino acids. In a similar manner, the evolution of protein folds can be at least partially described by an analogous process, where each step involves comparatively simple changes affecting few secondary structure elements. A number of such evolution steps, justified by biologically confirmed examples, have previously been proposed by other researchers. However, unlike the situation with sequences, as far as we know there have been no attempts to estimate the comparative probabilities for different kinds of such structural changes. Results: We have tried …