Development and performance evaluation of neural network classifiers for Indian internet shoppers

The rapid growth of usage of internet has paved the way towards the use of online shopping. Consumers’ behavior is one of the significant aspects that is considered by the service providers for the improvement of various services. Consumers are generally satisfied if their needs are fulfilled. In this paper an in depth investigation is made on the behavior of Indian consumers towards online shopping. Factor analysis is carried out to extract significant factors that affect online shopping of Indian consumers and these consumers are clustered based on their behavior, towards online shopping using hierarchical clustering. Employing the results of clustering in training of multilayer perceptron (MLP), functional link artificial neural network (FLANN) and radial basis function (RBF) networks efficient classifier models are developed. The performance of these classifiers are evaluated and compared with those obtained by conventional statistical based discriminant analysis. The simulation study demonstrates that the RBF network provides best classification performance of internet shoppers compared to those given by the FLANN, MLP and discriminant analysis based methods. The simulation study on the impact of different combination of inputs demonstrates that demographic input has least effect on classification performance. On the other hand the combination of psychological and cultural inputs play the most significant role in classification followed by psychological and then cultural inputs alone.     

Efficient clustering of radial basis perceptron neural network for pattern recognition

This paper studies how to train a new feed-forward neural network, radial basis perceptron (RBP) neural network, for distinguishing different sets in R^L. RBP neural network is based on radial basis function (RBF) neural network and perceptron neural network. It has two hidden layers where the nodes are not fully connected but use selective connection. A training algorithm corresponding to the structure of RBP network is presented. It adopts the input-output clustering (IOC) method to provide an efficient and powerful procedure for constructing a RBP network that generalizes very well. First, during the learning procedure, RBP neural network adopts IOC method to define the number of units of hidden layers and select centers. Second, the width parameter σ of centers is self-adjustable according to the information included in the learning samples. The effectiveness of this network is illustrated using an example taken from applications for component analysis of civil building materials. Simulation shows that RBP neural network can be used to predict the components of civil building materials successfully and gets good generalization ability.     

A review of genetic algorithms applied to training radial basis function networks

The problems associated with training feedforward artificial neural networks (ANNs) such as the multilayer perceptron (MLP) network and radial basis function (RBF) network have been well documented. The solutions to these problems have inspired a considerable amount of research, one particular area being the application of evolutionary search algorithms such as the genetic algorithm (GA). To date, the vast majority of GA solutions have been aimed at the MLP network. This paper begins with a brief overview of feedforward ANNs and GAs followed by a review of the current state of research in applying evolutionary techniques to training RBF networks.     

Multilayer perceptrons and radial basis function neural network methods for the solution of differential equations: A survey

Since neural networks have universal approximation capabilities, therefore it is possible to postulate them as solutions for given differential equations that define unsupervised errors. In this paper, we present a wide survey and classification of different Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) and Radial Basis Function (RBF) neural network techniques, which are used for solving differential equations of various kinds. Our main purpose is to provide a synthesis of the published research works in this area and stimulate further research interest and effort in the identified topics. Here, we describe the crux of various research articles published by numerous researchers, mostly within the last 10 years to get a better knowledge about the present scenario.     

Use of methodological diversity to improve neural network generalisation

Littlewood and Miller [4] present a statistical framework for dealing with coincident failures in multiversion software systems. They develop a theoretical model that holds the promise of high system reliability through the use of multiple, diverse sets of alternative versions. In this paper, we adapt their framework to investigate the feasibility of exploiting the diversity observable in multiple populations of neural networks developed using diverse methodologies. We evaluate the generalisation improvements achieved by a range of methodologically diverse network generation processes. We attempt to order the constituent methodological features with respect to their potential for use in the engineering of useful diversity. We also define and explore the use of relative measures of the diversity between version sets as a guide to the potential for exploiting interset diversity.     

A study on the use of statistical tests for experimentation with neural networks: Analysis of parametric test conditions and non-parametric tests

In this paper, we focus on the experimental analysis on the performance in artificial neural networks with the use of statistical tests on the classification task. Particularly, we have studied whether the sample of results from multiple trials obtained by conventional artificial neural networks and support vector machines checks the necessary conditions for being analyzed through parametrical tests. The study is conducted by considering three possibilities on classification experiments: random variation in the selection of test data, the selection of training data and internal randomness in the learning algorithm.The results obtained state that the fulfillment of these conditions are problem-dependent and indefinite, which justifies the need of using non-parametric statistics in the experimental analysis.     

Minimax classifiers based on neural networks

The problem of designing a classifier when prior probabilities are not known or are not representative of the underlying data distribution is discussed in this paper. Traditional learning approaches based on the assumption that class priors are stationary lead to sub-optimal solutions if there is a mismatch between training and future (real) priors. To protect against this uncertainty, a minimax approach may be desirable. We address the problem of designing a neural-based minimax classifier and propose two different algorithms: a learning rate scaling algorithm and a gradient-based algorithm. Experimental results show that both succeed in finding the minimax solution and it is also pointed out the differences between common approaches to cope with this uncertainty in priors and the minimax classifier.     

The bridge relating process neural networks and traditional neural networks

The process neural network (PrNN) is an ANN model suited for solving the learning problems with signal inputs, whose elementary unit is the process neuron (PN), an emerging neuron model. There is an essential difference between the process neuron and traditional neurons, but there also exists a relation between them. The former can be approximated by the latter within any precision. First, the PN model and some PrNNs are introduced in brief. And then, two PN approximating theorems are presented and proved in detail. Each theorem gives an approximating model to the PN model, i.e., the time-domain feature expansion model and the orthogonal decomposition feature expansion model. Some corollaries are given for the PrNNs based on these two theorems. Thereafter, simulation studies are performed on some simulated signal sets and a real dataset. The results show that the PrNN can effectively suppress noises polluting the signals and generalize quite well. Finally some problems on PrNNs are discussed and further research directions are suggested.     

Learning experiments with genetic optimization of a generalized regression neural network

This paper reports a study unifying optimization by genetic algorithm with a generalized regression neural network. Experiments compare hill-climbing optimization with that of a genetic algorithm, both in conjunction with a generalized regression neural network. Controlled data with nine independent variables are used in combination with conjunctive and compensatory decision forms, having zero percent and 10 percent noise levels. Results consistently favor the GRNN unified with the genetic algorithm.     

Application of radial basis function neural network for differential relaying of a power transformer

Function approximation has been found in many applications. The radial basis function network is one of the approaches which has shown a great promise in this sort of problems because of its faster learning capacity. The application of RBF neural network for differential relaying of power transformer is presented in this paper. Performance of this model is compared with feed-forward neural network (FFNN). The proposed method of power transformer protection is evaluated using simulation performed with EMTP package. The proposed model requires less training time and is more accurate in prediction as compared to FFNN.     

Application of a radial basis function artificial neural network to seismic data inversion

We investigate here the performance and the application of a radial basis function artificial neural network (RBF-ANN) type, in the inversion of seismic data. The proposed structure has the advantage of being easily trained by means of a back-propagation algorithm without getting stuck in local minima. The effects of network architectures, i.e. the number of neurons in the hidden layer, the rate of convergence and prediction accuracy of ANN models are examined. The optimum network parameters and performance were decided as a function of testing error convergence with respect to the network training error. An adequate cross-validation test is run to ensure the performance of the network on new data sets. The application of such a network to synthetic and real data shows that the inverted acoustic impedance section was efficient.     

Learning Bayesian network classifiers from label proportions

This paper deals with a classification problem known as learning from label proportions. The provided dataset is composed of unlabeled instances and is divided into disjoint groups. General class information is given within the groups: the proportion of instances of the group that belong to each class.We have developed a method based on the Structural EM strategy that learns Bayesian network classifiers to deal with the exposed problem. Four versions of our proposal are evaluated on synthetic data, and compared with state-of-the-art approaches on real datasets from public repositories. The results obtained show a competitive behavior for the proposed algorithm.     

On-line neural training algorithm with sliding mode control and adaptive learning rate

This paper presents a new algorithm for on-line artificial neural networks (ANN) training. The network topology is a standard multilayer perceptron (MLP) and the training algorithm is based on the theory of variable structure systems (VSS) and sliding mode control (SMC). The main feature of this novel procedure is the adaptability of the gain (learning rate), which is obtained from sliding mode surface so that system stability is guaranteed.     

Fast evaluation of neural networks via confidence rating

Neural networks have become very useful tools for input–output knowledge discovery. However, some of the most powerful schemes require very complex machines and, thus, a large amount of calculation. This paper presents a general technique to reduce the computational burden associated with the operational phase of most neural networks that calculate their output as a weighted sum of terms, which comprises a wide variety of schemes, such as Multi-Net or Radial Basis Function networks. Basically, the idea consists on sequentially evaluating the sum terms, using a series of thresholds which are associated with the confidence that a partial output will coincide with the overall network classification criterion. Furthermore, we design some procedures for conveniently sorting out the network units, so that the most important ones are evaluated first. The possibilities of this strategy are illustrated with some experiments on a benchmark of binary classification problems, using RealAdaboost and RBF networks, which show that important computational savings can be achieved without significant degradation in terms of recognition accuracy.     

Nonsmooth training of fuzzy neural networks

The integration of fuzzy methods and neural networks often leads to nonsmoothness of the neural network and, consequently, to a nonsmooth training problem. It is shown, that smooth training methods as e.g. backpropagation fail to converge in this case. Thus a method – based on so called bundle-methods – for training of nonsmooth neural network is presented. Numerical results obtained from a character recognition problem show, that this method still converges where backpropagation fails.     

Classification of binary document images into textual or nontextual data blocks using neural network models

This paper describes a new method for the classification of binary document images as textual or nontextual data blocks using neural network models. Binary document images are first segmented into blocks by the constrained run-length algorithm (CRLA). The component-labeling procedure is used to label the resulting blocks. The features for each block, calculated from the coordinates of its extremities, are then fed into the input layer of a neural network for classification. Four neural networks were considered, and they include back propagation (BP), radial basis functions (RBF), probabilistic neural network (PNN), and Kohonen's self-organizing feature maps (SOFMs). The performance and behavior of these neural network models are analyzed and compared in terms of training times, memory requirements, and classification accuracy. The experiments carried out on a variety of medical journals show the feasibility of using the neural network approach for textual block classification and indicate that in terms of both accuracy and training time RBF should be preferred.     

Evaluation of the Simplex method for training simple multilayer neural networks

A learning algorithm based on the modified Simplex method is proposed for training multilayer neural networks. This algorithm is tested for neural modelling of experimental results obtained during cross-flow filtration tests. The Simplex method is compared to standard back-propagation. Simpler to implement, Simplex has allowed us to achieve better results over four different databases with lower calculation times. The Simplex algorithm is therefore of interest compared to the classical learning techniques for simple neural structures.     

The improved radial basis function neural network and its application

Compared with other feed-forward neural networks, radial basis function neural networks (RBFNN) have many advantages which make them more suitable for nonlinear system modeling, and they have recently received considerable attention. In this paper, a RBFNN is employed to model strongly nonlinear systems. First, the problems of nonlinear system modeling are analyzed, and then the structure of the RBFNN as well as the training algorithm are improved to solve these problems. Finally, an industrial high-purity distillation column, which is a strongly nonlinear system, is successfully modeled with the improved RBFNN. Owing to the complexities of a nonlinear system, it is necessary to use a real-time model correction method to modify the parameters of the RBFNN model in real time. One efficient method is proposed in this paper. The idea is to employ the Givens transformation to modify the parameters of the RBFNN-based model. This work was presented, in part, at the International Symposium on Artificial Life and Robotics, Oita, Japan, February 18–20, 1996     

用于遥感图象分类的神经网络的构造

径向基子数神经网络和多层感知器神经网络具有相似的拓扑结构,它们大都用于目标的分类。对两种模型进行了比较,提出了一个构造径向基函数神经网络分类器的有效方法,并把构造的分类器用于遥感图象的分类实验,取得了比较好的结果。