The R Project SVN R-packages

\name{agnes}
\alias{agnes}
\title{Agglomerative Nesting (Hierarchical Clustering)}
\concept{UPGMA clustering}
\description{
  Computes agglomerative hierarchical clustering of the dataset.
}
\usage{
agnes(x, diss = inherits(x, "dist"), metric = "euclidean",
      stand = FALSE, method = "average", par.method,
      keep.diss = n < 100, keep.data = !diss, trace.lev = 0)
}
\arguments{
  \item{x}{
    data matrix or data frame, or dissimilarity matrix, depending on the
    value of the \code{diss} argument.

    In case of a matrix or data frame, each row corresponds to an observation,
    and each column corresponds to a variable. All variables must be numeric.
    Missing values (NAs) are allowed.

    In case of a dissimilarity matrix, \code{x} is typically the output of
    \code{\link{daisy}} or \code{\link{dist}}.
    Also a vector with length n*(n-1)/2 is allowed (where n is the number
    of observations), and will be interpreted in the same way as the
    output of the above-mentioned functions. Missing values (NAs) are not
    allowed.
  }
  \item{diss}{
    logical flag: if TRUE (default for \code{dist} or
    \code{dissimilarity} objects), then \code{x} is assumed to be a
    dissimilarity matrix.  If FALSE, then \code{x} is treated as
    a matrix of observations by variables.
  }
  \item{metric}{
    character string specifying the metric to be used for calculating
    dissimilarities between observations.
    The currently available options are \code{"euclidean"} and \code{"manhattan"}.
    Euclidean distances are root sum-of-squares of differences, and
    manhattan distances are the sum of absolute differences.
    If \code{x} is already a dissimilarity matrix, then this argument will
    be ignored.
  }
  \item{stand}{
    logical flag: if TRUE, then the measurements in \code{x} are
    standardized before calculating the dissimilarities. Measurements
    are standardized for each variable (column), by subtracting the
    variable's mean value and dividing by the variable's mean absolute
    deviation.  If \code{x} is already a dissimilarity matrix, then this
    argument will be ignored.
  }
  \item{method}{
    character string defining the clustering method.  The six methods
    implemented are
    \code{"average"} ([unweighted pair-]group [arithMetic] average method, aka \sQuote{UPGMA}),
    \code{"single"} (single linkage), \code{"complete"} (complete linkage),
    \code{"ward"} (Ward's method),
    \code{"weighted"} (weighted average linkage, aka \sQuote{WPGMA}), its generalization
    \code{"flexible"} which uses (a constant version of)
    the Lance-Williams formula and the \code{par.method} argument, and
    \code{"gaverage"} a generalized \code{"average"} aka \dQuote{flexible
    UPGMA} method also using the Lance-Williams formula and \code{par.method}.

    The default is \code{"average"}.
  }
  \item{par.method}{
    If \code{method} is \code{"flexible"} or \code{"gaverage"}, a numeric
    vector of length 1, 3, or 4, (with a default for \code{"gaverage"}), see in
    the details section.
  }
  \item{keep.diss, keep.data}{logicals indicating if the dissimilarities
    and/or input data \code{x} should be kept in the result.  Setting
    these to \code{FALSE} can give much smaller results and hence even save
    memory allocation \emph{time}.}
  \item{trace.lev}{integer specifying a trace level for printing
    diagnostics during the algorithm.  Default \code{0} does not print
    anything; higher values print increasingly more.}
}
\value{
  an object of class \code{"agnes"} (which extends \code{"twins"})
  representing the clustering.  See \code{\link{agnes.object}} for
  details, and methods applicable.
}
\author{
  Method \code{"gaverage"} has been contributed by Pierre Roudier, Landcare
  Research, New Zealand.
}
\details{
  \code{agnes} is fully described in chapter 5 of Kaufman and Rousseeuw (1990).
  Compared to other agglomerative clustering methods such as \code{hclust},
  \code{agnes} has the following features: (a) it yields the
  agglomerative coefficient (see \code{\link{agnes.object}})
  which measures the amount of clustering structure found; and (b)
  apart from the usual tree it also provides the banner, a novel
  graphical display (see \code{\link{plot.agnes}}).

  The \code{agnes}-algorithm constructs a hierarchy of clusterings.\cr
  At first, each observation is a small cluster by itself.  Clusters are
  merged until only one large cluster remains which contains all the
  observations.  At each stage the two \emph{nearest} clusters are combined
  to form one larger cluster.

  For \code{method="average"}, the distance between two clusters is the
  average of the dissimilarities between the points in one cluster and the
  points in the other cluster.
  \cr
  In \code{method="single"}, we use the smallest dissimilarity between a
  point in the first cluster and a point in the second cluster (nearest
  neighbor method).
  \cr
  When \code{method="complete"}, we use the largest dissimilarity
  between a point in the first cluster and a point in the second cluster
  (furthest neighbor method).

  The \code{method = "flexible"} allows (and requires) more details:
  The Lance-Williams formula specifies how dissimilarities are
  computed when clusters are agglomerated (equation (32) in K&R(1990),
  p.237).  If clusters \eqn{C_1} and \eqn{C_2} are agglomerated into a
  new cluster, the dissimilarity between their union and another
  cluster \eqn{Q} is given by
  \deqn{
    D(C_1 \cup C_2, Q) = \alpha_1 * D(C_1, Q) + \alpha_2 * D(C_2, Q) +
                         \beta * D(C_1,C_2) + \gamma * |D(C_1, Q) - D(C_2, Q)|,
  }
  where the four coefficients \eqn{(\alpha_1, \alpha_2, \beta, \gamma)}
  are specified by the vector \code{par.method}, either directly as vector of
  length 4, or (more conveniently) if \code{par.method} is of length 1,
  say \eqn{= \alpha}, \code{par.method} is extended to
  give the \dQuote{Flexible Strategy} (K&R(1990), p.236 f) with
  Lance-Williams coefficients \eqn{(\alpha_1 = \alpha_2 = \alpha, \beta =
    1 - 2\alpha, \gamma=0)}.\cr
  Also, if \code{length(par.method) == 3}, \eqn{\gamma = 0} is set.

  \bold{Care} and expertise is probably needed when using \code{method = "flexible"}
  particularly for the case when \code{par.method} is specified of
  longer length than one.  Since \pkg{cluster} version 2.0, choices
  leading to invalid \code{merge} structures now signal an error (from
  the C code already).
  The \emph{weighted average} (\code{method="weighted"}) is the same as
  \code{method="flexible", par.method = 0.5}.  Further,
  \code{method= "single"}  is equivalent to \code{method="flexible", par.method = c(.5,.5,0,-.5)}, and
  \code{method="complete"} is equivalent to \code{method="flexible", par.method = c(.5,.5,0,+.5)}.

  The \code{method = "gaverage"} is a generalization of \code{"average"}, aka
  \dQuote{flexible UPGMA} method, and is (a generalization of the approach)
  detailed in Belbin et al. (1992).  As \code{"flexible"}, it uses the
  Lance-Williams formula above for dissimilarity updating, but with
  \eqn{\alpha_1} and \eqn{\alpha_2} not constant, but \emph{proportional} to
  the \emph{sizes} \eqn{n_1} and \eqn{n_2} of the clusters \eqn{C_1} and
  \eqn{C_2} respectively, i.e,
  \deqn{\alpha_j = \alpha'_j \frac{n_1}{n_1+n_2},}{%
        \alpha_j = \alpha'_j * n_1/(n_1 + n_2),}
  where \eqn{\alpha'_1}, \eqn{\alpha'_2} are determined from \code{par.method},
  either directly as \eqn{(\alpha_1, \alpha_2, \beta, \gamma)} or
  \eqn{(\alpha_1, \alpha_2, \beta)} with \eqn{\gamma = 0}, or (less flexibly,
  but more conveniently) as follows:

  Belbin et al proposed \dQuote{flexible beta}, i.e. the user would only
  specify \eqn{\beta} (as \code{par.method}), sensibly in
  \deqn{-1 \leq \beta < 1,}{-1 \le \beta < 1,}
  and \eqn{\beta} determines \eqn{\alpha'_1} and \eqn{\alpha'_2} as
  \deqn{\alpha'_j = 1 - \beta,} and \eqn{\gamma = 0}.

  This \eqn{\beta} may be specified by \code{par.method} (as length 1 vector),
  and if \code{par.method} is not specified, a default value of -0.1 is used,
  as Belbin et al recommend taking a \eqn{\beta} value around -0.1 as a general
  agglomerative hierarchical clustering strategy.

  Note that \code{method = "gaverage", par.method = 0} (or \code{par.method =
  c(1,1,0,0)}) is equivalent to the \code{agnes()} default method \code{"average"}.
}
\section{BACKGROUND}{
  Cluster analysis divides a dataset into groups (clusters) of
  observations that are similar to each other.
  \describe{
    \item{Hierarchical methods}{like
      \code{agnes}, \code{\link{diana}}, and \code{\link{mona}}
      construct a hierarchy of clusterings, with the number of clusters
      ranging from one to the number of observations.}
    \item{Partitioning methods}{like
      \code{\link{pam}}, \code{\link{clara}}, and \code{\link{fanny}}
      require that the number of clusters be given by the user.}
    }
}
\references{
  Kaufman, L. and Rousseeuw, P.J. (1990). (=: \dQuote{K&R(1990)})
  \emph{Finding Groups in Data: An Introduction to Cluster Analysis}.
  Wiley, New York.

  Anja Struyf, Mia Hubert and Peter J. Rousseeuw (1996)
  Clustering in an Object-Oriented Environment.
  \emph{Journal of Statistical Software} \bold{1}.
  \doi{10.18637/jss.v001.i04}

  Struyf, A., Hubert, M. and Rousseeuw, P.J. (1997). Integrating
  Robust Clustering Techniques in S-PLUS,
  \emph{Computational Statistics and Data Analysis}, \bold{26}, 17--37.

  Lance, G.N., and W.T. Williams (1966).
  A General Theory of Classifactory Sorting Strategies, I. Hierarchical
  Systems.
  \emph{Computer J.} \bold{9}, 373--380.

  Belbin, L., Faith, D.P. and Milligan, G.W. (1992). A Comparison of
  Two Approaches to Beta-Flexible Clustering.
  \emph{Multivariate Behavioral Research}, \bold{27}, 417--433.

}
\seealso{
  \code{\link{agnes.object}}, \code{\link{daisy}}, \code{\link{diana}},
  \code{\link{dist}}, \code{\link{hclust}}, \code{\link{plot.agnes}},
  \code{\link{twins.object}}.
}
\examples{
data(votes.repub)
agn1 <- agnes(votes.repub, metric = "manhattan", stand = TRUE)
agn1
plot(agn1)

op <- par(mfrow=c(2,2))
agn2 <- agnes(daisy(votes.repub), diss = TRUE, method = "complete")
plot(agn2)
## alpha = 0.625 ==> beta = -1/4  is "recommended" by some
agnS <- agnes(votes.repub, method = "flexible", par.method = 0.625)
plot(agnS)
par(op)

## "show" equivalence of three "flexible" special cases
d.vr <- daisy(votes.repub)
a.wgt  <- agnes(d.vr, method = "weighted")
a.sing <- agnes(d.vr, method = "single")
a.comp <- agnes(d.vr, method = "complete")
iC <- -(6:7) # not using 'call' and 'method' for comparisons
stopifnot(
  all.equal(a.wgt [iC], agnes(d.vr, method="flexible", par.method = 0.5)[iC])   ,
  all.equal(a.sing[iC], agnes(d.vr, method="flex", par.method= c(.5,.5,0, -.5))[iC]),
  all.equal(a.comp[iC], agnes(d.vr, method="flex", par.method= c(.5,.5,0, +.5))[iC]))

## Exploring the dendrogram structure
(d2 <- as.dendrogram(agn2)) # two main branches
d2[[1]] # the first branch
d2[[2]] # the 2nd one  { 8 + 42  = 50 }
d2[[1]][[1]]# first sub-branch of branch 1 .. and shorter form
identical(d2[[c(1,1)]],
          d2[[1]][[1]])
## a "textual picture" of the dendrogram :
str(d2)

data(agriculture)

## Plot similar to Figure 7 in ref
\dontrun{plot(agnes(agriculture), ask = TRUE)}
\dontshow{plot(agnes(agriculture))}

data(animals)
aa.a  <- agnes(animals) # default method = "average"
aa.ga <- agnes(animals, method = "gaverage")
op <- par(mfcol=1:2, mgp=c(1.5, 0.6, 0), mar=c(.1+ c(4,3,2,1)),
          cex.main=0.8)
plot(aa.a,  which.plots = 2)
plot(aa.ga, which.plots = 2)
par(op)
\dontshow{## equivalence
stopifnot( ## below show  ave == gave(0); here  ave == gave(c(1,1,0,0)):
  all.equal(aa.a [iC], agnes(animals, method="gave", par.method= c(1,1,0,0))[iC]),
  all.equal(aa.ga[iC], agnes(animals, method="gave", par.method= -0.1      )[iC]),
  all.equal(aa.ga[iC], agnes(animals, method="gav",  par.method=c(1.1,1.1,-0.1,0))[iC]))
}

## Show how "gaverage" is a "generalized average":
aa.ga.0 <- agnes(animals, method = "gaverage", par.method = 0)
stopifnot(all.equal(aa.ga.0[iC], aa.a[iC]))
}
\keyword{cluster}