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Contributions to Unsupervised and Semi-Supervised LearningPal, David 21 May 2009 (has links)
This thesis studies two problems in theoretical machine learning. The first
part of the thesis investigates the statistical stability of clustering
algorithms. In the second part, we study the relative advantage of having
unlabeled data in classification problems.
Clustering stability was proposed and used as a model selection method in
clustering tasks. The main idea of the method is that from a given data set
two independent samples are taken. Each sample individually is clustered with
the same clustering algorithm, with the same setting of its parameters. If the
two resulting clusterings turn out to be close in some metric, it is concluded
that the clustering algorithm and the setting of its parameters match the data
set, and that clusterings obtained are meaningful. We study asymptotic
properties of this method for certain types of cost minimizing clustering
algorithms and relate their asymptotic stability to the number of optimal
solutions of the underlying optimization problem.
In classification problems, it is often expensive to obtain labeled data, but
on the other hand, unlabeled data are often plentiful and cheap. We study how
the access to unlabeled data can decrease the amount of labeled data
needed in the worst-case sense. We propose an extension of the probably
approximately correct (PAC) model in which this question can be naturally
studied. We show that for certain basic tasks the access to unlabeled data
might, at best, halve the amount of labeled data needed.
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Secession and Survival: Nations, States and Violent ConflictSiroky, David S. January 2009 (has links)
<p>Secession is a watershed event not only for the new state that is created and the old state that is dissolved, but also for neighboring states, proximate ethno-political groups and major powers. This project examines the problem of violent secessionist conflict and addresses an important debate at the intersection of comparative and international politics about the conditions under which secession is a peaceful solution to ethnic conflict. It demonstrates that secession is rarely a solution to ethnic conflict, does not assure the protection of remaining minorities and produces new forms of violence. To explain why some secessions produce peace, while others generate violence, the project develops a theoretical model of the conditions that produce internally coherent, stable and peaceful post-secessionist states rather than recursive secession (i.e., secession from a new secessionist state) or interstate disputes between the rump and secessionist state. Theoretically, the analysis reveals a curvilinear relationship between ethno-territorial heterogeneity and conflict, explains disparate findings in the literature on ethnic conflict and conclusively links ethnic structure and violence. The project also contributes to the literature on secessionist violence, and civil war more generally, by linking intrastate and interstate causes, showing that what is frequently thought of as a domestic phenomenon is in fact mostly a phenomenon of international politics. Drawing upon original data, methodological advances at the interface of statistics, computer science and probability theory, and qualitative methods such as elite interviews and archival research, the project offers a comprehensive, comparative and contextual treatment of secession and violence.</p> / Dissertation
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Unsupervised Activity Discovery and Characterization for Sensor-Rich EnvironmentsHamid, Muhammad Raffay 28 November 2005 (has links)
This thesis presents an unsupervised method for discovering and analyzing the different
kinds of activities in an active environment. Drawing from natural language processing, a
novel representation of activities as bags of event n-grams is introduced, where the global
structural information of activities using their local event statistics is analyzed. It is demonstrated how maximal cliques in an undirected edge-weighted graph of activities, can be used in an unsupervised manner, to discover the different activity-classes. Taking on some work done in computer networks and bio-informatics, it is shown how to characterize these discovered activity-classes from a wholestic as well as a by-parts view-point. A definition of anomalous activities is formulated along with a way to detect them based on the difference of an activity instance from each of the discovered activity-classes. Finally, an information theoretic method to explain the detected anomalies in a human-interpretable form is presented. Results over extensive data-sets, collected from multiple active environments are
presented, to show the competence and generalizability of the proposed framework.
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Subjektiv risk i trafiken - skillnad mellan kvinnor och mänLinderang, Jenny January 2001 (has links)
<p>Vi gör dagligen bedömningar av risker i situationer av alla de slag. Trafiken är en av de situationer där riskbedömningar är särskilt viktiga och hur korrekt bedömningen blir beror på hur vi upplever riskerna, vilket i hög grad varierar från person till person. Hypotesen i detta examensarbete är: Kvinnliga bilister upplever större subjektiv risk i trafiken än manliga bilister. Undersökningen av hypotesens giltighet utfördes med hjälp av intervjuer av 20 män och kvinnor. Frågorna syftade till att ta reda på deltagarnas subjektiva upplevelser av trafikrisker. Resultaten pekade på att det finns en tendens till skillnad i hur de båda könen upplever risker i trafiken. Kunskap om hur kvinnor och män upplever risker i trafiken är användbara för att göra olika trafiksituationer säkrare och därmed minska antalet olyckor. Ännu ett steg i denna strävan är att undersöka hur stressfaktorer påverkar riskuppfattningen i en trafiksituation.</p>
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Educational studies in heat and power technology : how students learn with multimedia tools and problem-based learningAbbes, Yacine January 2005 (has links)
<p>Higher education is undergoing continuous changes and new learning tools and methods are implemented. Researchers in education do not always agree upon the effectiveness of some of the methods introduced into engineering education. The present thesis consists of two case studies on educational methods introduced at the Department of Energy Technology, at Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Sweden. The qualitative research methodology has been used in case one and a combination of qualitative and quantitative methodology has been used in the second case. The sources of evidences consisted of: unstructured interviews, analysis of video recording, questionnaires, and analysis of a variety of documents. In the first case, an educational program in heat and power technology was analysed. The second case consists in an in-depth study of group dynamics in a Problem –Based Learning course. These studies showed that the learning approach adopted by students depends strongly on the way they view the particular learning tool or method. The first case study revealed the existence of two types of learners. Surfacelearners follow the structure suggested by the designers of the multimedia program. This category of learners focuses only on the material available in the program. Deep-learners go beyond the information and the structure suggested in the program and combine different learning tools in their learning. These students do not follow the structure of the tutorials’ of the multimedia program. This study showed that students who had a strong view how to learn with a multimedia program or a learning method benefited less from the learning tools available. Students with weak views on how to learn from educational program or leaning tool benefit less from the presentation and engage in more surface learning. Self-motivated learners use the multimedia presentation in novel ways and crosscheck the information given with other material. The second study showed that students have unclear and weak views on how to learn with student-directed Problem- Based Learning model. Four types of learners were identified in Problem-Based Learning project: Leaders, Key Actors, Common Students and Social Loafers. Leaders and Key Actors are self-motivated individuals and participate most in the projects. Students who viewed themselves or were viewed as leaders were held responsible to take most of the decisions and students expected them to work more than the average student. Students who viewed themselves as common team members expected a lower workload than leaders’. Key Actors are self-motivated students who do not view themselves as separate from other group members but who participate more than others. Leaders learned more group and social processes, that they did not fully take part in, while common students learned more from the project management aspects that they did not take part in. The study also found that Problem-Based Learning groups can become very cohesive, and can develop distorted views on how to learn with Problem-Based Learning, and un-common group dynamics phenomena such as groupthink can occur in Problem-Based Learning setting.</p>
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Transfer and the fuzzy-trace theoryMassey, M. Ryan. January 1900 (has links)
Title from title page of PDF (University of Missouri--St. Louis, viewed February 24, 2010). Includes bibliographical references (p. 29-30).
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Teaching Literature in English at High School Level : A Discussion of the Socio-Cultural Learning Theory vs the Transmission TheoryDickfors, Erika January 2015 (has links)
This essay discusses if teaching English literature in high school classes, in accordance with the socio-cultural learning theory, can be considered to promote language learning substantially better than teaching English literature in accordance with the transmission theory. This essay also investigates and compares how well teaching English literature, in accordance with each of these two learning theories, fulfills stipulations in the Swedish National Curriculum for high school courses English 5, 6 and 7. In order to show differences between the socio-cultural learning theory and the transmission theory there are presentations and discussions of different teaching strategies and learning tasks/exercises in accordance with each of these two learning theories. The base for argumentation in this essay is constituted by analytical and theoretical studies of teaching English literature in accordance with the socio-cultural learning theory and in accordance with the transmission theory. There are also theoretical studies of the Swedish National Curriculum (of high school courses English 5, 6 and 7) and previous empirical research and studies (which include teaching and/or language learning and the socio-cultural learning theory). This essay also includes a presentation and discussion of advantages and disadvantages for each learning theory.
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Cognitive load theory and programmed instructionBrazas, Michael L 01 June 2005 (has links)
Programmed Instruction was a dominant force in educational research during the 1960's and early 1970's. During this period a new cognitively oriented psychology of education arose that eventually replaced the behaviorally driven research into programmed instruction. For some reason little work was done on integrating these two approaches. This study was designed to test a programmed instructional system based on the intrinsic programmed instructional technology of Crowder (1961) but incorporating design elements derived from cognitive load theory (Sweller, 1988). Specifically, this study tested a multimedia programmed instructional system (CLT-PI) based on work by Mayer (2001) against a text based system (TXT), a traditional linear programmed instructional system based on Skinner (1954, 1958)(LPI), and an intrinsic programmed instructional system based on the work of Crowder (1960, 1961)(IPI).
Three hypotheses were tested; 1) Programmed instruction would produce higher long-term retention and transfer scores than TXT, 2) IPI would produced higher long-term retention and transfer scores than LPI, and 3) CLT-PI would produce higher long-term retention and transfer scores than LPI or IPI. 115 undergraduate university students were randomly assigned to one of four conditions where they studied a chapter on human sleep. Each condition was presented on a computer with a test following study. A long-term test was given 4 weeks later. Both short- and long-term tests contained retention and transfer questions. Analyses were conducted using repeated measures MANOVA. A series of ANOVA tests were conducted to determine specific effects and interactions. The first hypothesis was partly supported in that CLT-PI and IPI produced higher long-term retention scores than TXT. LPI, however, did not.
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Cognitive reading strategies instruction for children with specific language impairmentLau, Ka-ming., 劉家明. January 2012 (has links)
The primarily goal of this study was to examine the patterns of cognitive and
language processing of children with Specific Language Impairment (SLI) and how
they related to their text comprehension, interpreted within constructivism. The study
aimed to characterize the difference in language, character decoding, metacognitive
processing and text comprehension between children with SLI and those under typical
development; to identify the inter-relationships among their language processing,
character decoding, metacognitive processing and text comprehension; and to
investigate how the implementation of cognitive reading strategies instruction change
their language processing, character decoding, metacognitive processing, belief
towards reading and text comprehension. Two studies were carried out.
In Study One, 73 participants were recruited from two Hong Kong primary
schools; they were at second and third grade, 42 were diagnosed of SLI and the other
were under typical development. Standardized instruments were used to tap children’s
language processing and character decoding respectively. Researcher developed
Metacognitive Processing Scale were adopted to rate their metacognitive and deep
processing of text. A set of comprehension test, comprised of forced-choice inferential
questions and two recall tasks, were used to assess their depth in understanding
different types of text. Analyses indicated that SLI students did not only score poorer
in language processing, but also in character decoding, metacognitive processing and
text comprehension. Further analyses of both the entire sample and the SLI sample,
indicated that there were significant correlations between character decoding,
language processing, metacognitive processing with children’s text comprehension
scores.
In Study Two, there were 40 participants recruited from the SLI sample of the
Study One. Cognitive reading strategy instruction program were developed. 21
participants was randomly selected to receive the experimental instruction and the
another 19 were under conventional instruction as control. Besides the measures used
in the Study One, interviews and teacher-reporting questionnaires were used to tap
children’s belief towards reading and their classroom engagement. Analysis of
pre-instruction and post-instruction tests indicated the experimental children showed
significantly better progress on their oral language, text comprehension and belief
about reading. Both the experimental and the control group showed similar progress
on character decoding.
The study offers both theoretical and educational contribution on the literacy
development among the population of SLI. It identifies the role of metacognitive
processing on literacy achievement. It provides the evidence of implementing
cognitively-based reading strategies for literacy instruction for children with SLI
within Chinese context. Upon the introduction of inclusive education, teachers now
face students with much wider diversity, including a significant number of children
with SLI. Possible collaboration between frontline teachers and speech therapists in
designing potential classroom activities is discussed. / published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Education
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Computational applications of invariance principlesMeka, Raghu Vardhan Reddy 14 August 2015 (has links)
This thesis focuses on applications of classical tools from probability theory and convex analysis such as limit theorems to problems in theoretical computer science, specifically to pseudorandomness and learning theory. At first look, limit theorems, pseudorandomness and learning theory appear to be disparate subjects. However, as it has now become apparent, there's a strong connection between these questions through a third more abstract question: what do random objects look like. This connection is best illustrated by the study of the spectrum of Boolean functions which directly or indirectly played an important role in a plethora of results in complexity theory. The current thesis aims to take this program further by drawing on a variety of fundamental tools, both classical and new, in probability theory and analytic geometry. Our research contributions broadly fall into three categories. Probability Theory: The central limit theorem is one of the most important results in all of probability and richly studied topic. Motivated by questions in pseudorandomness and learning theory we obtain two new limit theorems or invariance principles. The proofs of these new results in probability, of interest on their own, have a computer science flavor and fall under the niche category of techniques from theoretical computer science with applications in pure mathematics. Pseudorandomness: Derandomizing natural complexity classes is a fundamental problem in complexity theory, with several applications outside complexity theory. Our work addresses such derandomization questions for natural and basic geometric concept classes such as halfspaces, polynomial threshold functions (PTFs) and polytopes. We develop a reasonably generic framework for obtaining pseudorandom generators (PRGs) from invariance principles and suitably apply the framework to old and new invariance principles to obtain the best known PRGs for these complexity classes. Learning Theory: Learning theory aims to understand what functions can be learned efficiently from examples. As developed in the seminal work of Linial, Mansour and Nisan (1994) and strengthened by several follow-up works, we now know strong connections between learning a class of functions and how sensitive to noise, as quantified by average sensitivity and noise sensitivity, the functions are. Besides their applications in learning, bounding the average and noise sensitivity has applications in hardness of approximation, voting theory, quantum computing and more. Here we address the question of bounding the sensitivity of polynomial threshold functions and intersections of halfspaces and obtain the best known results for these concept classes.
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