Skip to main content
Log in

Global investing risk: a case study of knowledge assessment via rough sets

  • Published:
Annals of Operations Research Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This paper presents an application of knowledge discovery via rough sets to a real life case study of global investing risk in 52 countries using 27 indicator variables. The aim is explanation of the classification of the countries according to financial risks assessed by Wall Street Journal international experts and knowledge discovery from data via decision rule mining, rather than prediction; i.e. to capture the explicit or implicit knowledge or policy of international financial experts, rather than to predict the actual classifications. Suggestions are made about the most significant attributes for each risk class and country, as well as the minimal set of decision rules needed. Our results compared favorably with those from discriminant analysis and several variations of preference disaggregation MCDA procedures. The same approach could be adapted to other problems with missing data in data mining, knowledge extraction, and different multi-criteria decision problems, like sorting, choice and ranking.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Barbagallo, S., Consoli, S., Pappalardo, N., Greco, S., & Zimbone, S. (2006). Discovering reservoir operating rules by a rough set approach. Water Resources Management, 20, 19–36.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Becerra-Fernandez, I., Zanakis, S., & Walczak, S. (2002). Knowledge discovery techniques for predicting country investment risk. Computers & Industrial Engineering, 43, 787–800.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Doumpos, M., Zanakis, S., & Zopounidis, C. (2001). Multicriteria preference disaggregation for classification problems with an application to global investing risk. Decision Science, 32, 1–52.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fayyad, U. M., & Irani, K. B. (1992). On the handling of continuous-valued attributes in decision tree generation. Machine Learning, 8, 87–102.

    Google Scholar 

  • Flinkman, M., Michalowski, W., Nilsson, S., Slowinski, R., Susmaga, R., & Wilk, Sz. (2000). Use of rough sets analysis to classify Siberian forest ecosystem according to net primary production of phytomass. INFOR, 38, 145–161.

    Google Scholar 

  • Greco, S., Matarazzo, B., & Slowinski, R. (1998). A new rough set approach to evaluation of bankruptcy risk. In C. Zopounidis (Ed.), Operational tools in the management of financial risks (pp. 121–136). Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Greco, S., Matarazzo, B., & Slowinski, R. (1999a). Rough approximation of a preference relation by dominance relations. European Journal of Operational Research, 117, 63–83.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Greco, S., Matarazzo, B., & Slowinski, R. (1999b). The use of rough sets and fuzzy sets in MCDM. In T. Gal, T. Stewart, & T. Hanne (Eds.), Advances in multiple-criteria decision making (pp. 14.1–14.59). Boston: Kluwer Academic Publishers. Chap. 14.

    Google Scholar 

  • Greco, S., Matarazzo, B., & Slowinski, R. (2000a). Extension of the rough set approach to multicriteria decision support. INFOR, 38, 161–196.

    Google Scholar 

  • Greco, S., Matarazzo, B., & Slowinski, R. (2000b). Dealing with missing data in rough set analysis of multi-attribute and multi-criteria decision problems. In S. H. Zanakis, G. Doukidis, & C. Zopounidis (Eds.), Decision making: Recent developments and worldwide applications (pp. 295–316). Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Greco, S., Matarazzo, B., & Slowinski, R. (2001). Rough sets theory for multicriteria decision analysis. European Journal of Operational Research, 129, 1–47.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Greco, S., Matarazzo, B., & Slowinski, R. (2002). Rough approximation by dominance relations. International Journal of Intelligent Systems, 17(2), 153–171.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Greco, S., Matarazzo, B., & Slowinski, R. (2004). Axiomatic characterization of a general utility function and its particular cases in terms of conjoint measurement and rough-set decision rules. European Journal of Operational Research, 158, 271–292.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Greco, S., Matarazzo, B., & Slowinski, R. (2005). Decision rule approach. In J. Figueira, S. Greco, & M. Ehrgott (Eds.), Multiple criteria decision analysis: state of the art surveys (pp. 507–562). New York: Springer. Chap. 13.

    Google Scholar 

  • Greco, S., Matarazzo, B., & Slowinski, R. (2007). Customer satisfaction analysis based on rough set approach. Zeitschrift für Betriebswirtschaft, 3, 325–339.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Grzymala-Busse, J. W. (1992). LERS—a system for learning from examples based on rough sets. In R. Slowinski (Ed.), Intelligent decision support. Handbook of applications and advances of the rough sets theory (pp. 3–18). Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Michalowski, W., Rubin, S., Slowinski, R., & Wilk, Sz. (2003). Mobile clinical support system for pediatric emergencies. Journal of Decision Support Systems, 36, 161–176.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pawlak, Z. (1982). Rough sets. International Journal of Information & Computer Sciences, 11, 341–356.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pawlak, Z. (1991). Rough sets: Theoretical aspects of reasoning about data. Dordrecht: Kluwer.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pawlak, Z., Grzymala-Busse, J. W., Slowinski, R., & Ziarko, W. (1995). Rough sets. Communications of the ACM, 38, 89–95.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rossi, L., Slowinski, R., & Susmaga, R. (1999). Rough set approach to evaluation of stormwater pollution. International Journal of Environment and Pollution, 12, 232–250.

    Google Scholar 

  • Saini, K. G., & Bates, P. S. (1984). A survey of the quantitative approaches to country risk analysis. Journal of Banking and Finance, 8, 341–356.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Slowinski, R., & Zopounidis, C. (1995). Application of the rough set approach to evaluation of bankruptcy risk. International Journal of Intelligent Systems in Accounting, Finance and Management, 4(1), 127–141.

    Google Scholar 

  • Slowinski, R., Greco, S., & Matarazzo, B. (2002). Axiomatization of utility, outranking and decision-rule preference models for multiple-criteria classification problems under partial inconsistency with the dominance principle. Control and Cybernetics, 31, 1005–1035.

    Google Scholar 

  • Slowinski, R., Greco, S., & Matarazzo, B. (2005). Rough set based decision support. In E. K. Burke & G. Kendall (Eds.), Search methodologies: introductory tutorials in optimization and decision support techniques (pp. 475–527). New York: Springer. Chap. 16.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stefanowski, J., & Vanderpooten, D. (2001). Induction of decision rules in classification and discovery-oriented perspectives. International Journal of Intelligent Systems, 16(1), 13–28.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tseng, T. L., & Huang, C. C. (2007). Rough set-based approach to feature selection in customer relationship management. Omega, 35(4), 365–383.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tsumoto, S. (1998). Automated extraction of medical expert system rules from clinical databases based on rough set theory. Information Sciences, 112, 67–84.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wilk, S., Slowinski, R., Michalowski, W., & Greco, S. (2005). Supporting triage of children with abdominal pain in the emergency room. European Journal of Operational Research, 160, 696–709.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zanakis, S., & Walter, G. (1994). Discriminant characteristics of U.S. banks acquired with or without federal assistance. European Journal of Operational Research, 77, 440–465.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zanakis, S. H., Austin, L., Nowading, D., & Silver, E. (1980). From teaching to implementing inventory management: problems of translation. Interfaces, 10(6), 103–110.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zopounidis, C., & Doumpos, M. (2002). Multi-group discrimination using multi-criteria analysis: Illustrations from the field of finance. European Journal of Operational Research, 139(2), 371–389.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Stelios Zanakis.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Greco, S., Matarazzo, B., Slowinski, R. et al. Global investing risk: a case study of knowledge assessment via rough sets. Ann Oper Res 185, 105–138 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10479-009-0542-3

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10479-009-0542-3

Keywords

Navigation