A weighted fuzzy c-means clustering model for fuzzy data

A fuzzy clustering model for fuzzy data is proposed. The model is based on a 'weighted' dissimilarity measure for comparing pairs of fuzzy data, composed by two distances, the so-called center (mode) distance and spread distance. The peculiarity of the proposed fuzzy clustering model is the objective estimation, incorporated in the clustering procedure, of suitable weights concerning the distance measures of the center and the spreads of the fuzzy data. In this way, the model objectively tunes the influence of the two components of the fuzzy data (center and spreads) for computing the mode and spread centroids in the fuzzy partitioning process. In order to show the performance of the proposed clustering algorithm, a simulation study and two illustrative applications are discussed. (c) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.