Construct · 1 fields · 1 citations

elbow: a standalone construct

One name. One construct. A landmark on the map.

● anchor · a standalone construct Nearest construct by meaning·not indexed
elbow1 CONSTRUCTElbow methodTHORNDIKE · 1953

A single standalone construct; nearby constructs are located against it in the Collider. Tap a field for its definition, unit, and measures.

Data science

The bend in a curve that picks a model size

In cluster analysis, the "elbow method" chooses how many clusters to keep by plotting a fit criterion (such as within-cluster variance) against the number of clusters and looking for the "elbow": the point where adding another cluster stops yielding a sharp improvement. Thorndike's 1953 Who belongs in the family? introduced this way of reading the bend in the curve to decide where further subdivision no longer pays. The referent is a heuristic stopping rule on a diminishing-returns curve, named only by visual analogy to a bent arm, and unrelated to a pipe fitting or a body joint.[1]

Unit
The cluster count at the bend of a fit-versus-complexity curve
Recovery means
Not applicable
Measured by
Identified by the point of diminishing returns in within-cluster variance as cluster count increases

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Nearby constructs

analogy4 fields · 4 citationsjingle · one word, four constructsbalance4 fields · 5 citationsjingle · one word, four constructsbend1 fields · 1 citationsanchor · a standalone construct

References

  1. Thorndike, R. L. (1953). Who belongs in the family? Psychometrika, 18(4), 267–276. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02289263

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