Predictive Analytics and Data Mining

4.2. Rule Induction

Rule induction is a data mining process of deducing if-then rules from a data set. These symbolic decision rules explain an inherent relationship between the attributes and class labels in the data set. Many real-life experiences are based on intuitive rule induction. For example, we can proclaim a rule that states “if it is 8 a.m. on a weekday, then highway traffic will be heavy” and “if it is 8 p.m. on a Sunday, then the traffic will be light.” These rules are not necessarily right all the time. 8 a.m. weekday traffic may be light during a holiday season. But, in general, these rules hold true and are deduced from real-life experience based on our every day observations. Rule induction provides a powerful classification approach ...