Abstract
Sixteen clustering methods are compatible with the general recurrence equation of combinatorial SAHN (sequential, agglomerative, hierarchical and nonoverlapping) classificatory strategies. These are subdivided into two classes: the d-SAHN methods seek for minimal between-cluster distances the h-SAHN strategies for maximal within-cluster homogeneity. The parameters and some basic features of all combinatorial methods are listed to allow comparisons between these two families of clustering procedures. Interest is centred on the h-SAHN techniques; the derivation of updating parameters is presented and the monotonicity properties are examined. Three new strategies are described, a weighted and an unweighted variant of the minimization of the increase of average distance within clusters and a homogeneity-optimizing flexible method. The performance of d- and h-SAHN techniques is compared using field data from the rock grassland communities of the Sashegy Nature Reserve, Budapest, Hungary.
Nomenclature
of syntaxa follows Soó, R. 1964. Synopsis systematico-geobotanica florae vegetationisque Hungariae I. Akadémiai, Budapest.
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Abbreviations
- CP:
-
Closest pair
- RNN:
-
Reciprocal nearest neighbor
- SAHN:
-
Sequential, agglomerative, hierarchical and nonoverlapping
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© 1989 Kluwer Academic Publishers
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Podani, J. (1989). New combinatorial clustering methods. In: Mucina, L., Dale, M.B. (eds) Numerical syntaxonomy. Advances in vegetation science, vol 10. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2432-1_5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2432-1_5
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