Implementing relevance feedback as convolutions of local neighborhoods on Self-Organizing Maps

Abstract

The Self-Organizing Map (SOM) can be used in implementing relevance feedback in an information retrieval system. In our approach, the map surface is convolved with a window function in order to spread the responses given by a human user for the seen data items. In this paper, a number of window functions with different sizes are compared in spreading positive and negative relevance information on the SOM surfaces in an image retrieval application. In addition, a novel method for incorporatinglo cation-dependent information on the relative distances of the map units in the window function is presented. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2002.