Data Clustering with Actuarial Applications

Guojun Gan and Emiliano A. Valdez

North American Actuarial Journal, 2020, vol. 24, issue 2, 168-186

Abstract: Data clustering refers to the process of dividing a set of objects into homogeneous groups or clusters such that the objects in each cluster are more similar to each other than to those of other clusters. As one of the most popular tools for exploratory data analysis, data clustering has been applied in many scientific areas. In this article, we give a review of the basics of data clustering, such as distance measures and cluster validity, and different types of clustering algorithms. We also demonstrate the applications of data clustering in insurance by using two scalable clustering algorithms, the truncated fuzzy c-means (TFCM) algorithm and the hierarchical k-means algorithm, to select representative variable annuity contracts, which are used to build predictive models. We found that the hierarchical k-means algorithm is efficient and produces high-quality representative variable annuity contracts.

Date: 2020
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/10920277.2019.1575242 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:uaajxx:v:24:y:2020:i:2:p:168-186

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/uaaj20

DOI: 10.1080/10920277.2019.1575242

Access Statistics for this article

North American Actuarial Journal is currently edited by Kathryn Baker

More articles in North American Actuarial Journal from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().