Association rule mining in cooperative research

Abstract

This study applies the data mining methods in economics research. Association rule mining and clustering techniques are used in the cooperative (United Producers, Inc) survey study, in order to find interesting patterns within the organization, especially the relationships between the company's strategies, members' characteristics, and the potential free riding problem. The data mining methods are evaluated and compared with the traditional statistics model to find the differences and similarities. Through our study, we can find data mining methods can be applied in the economics research. They can be used as a complement way to find out the hidden relationships within the organization, and construct the similar models as the traditional regression method.