{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,3,19]],"date-time":"2026-03-19T01:09:44Z","timestamp":1773882584572,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":56,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"11","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2019,11,19]],"date-time":"2019-11-19T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1574121600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Symmetry"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Grey relational analysis (GRA) is a part of the Grey system theory (GST). It is appropriate for solving problems with complicated interrelationships between multiple factors\/parameters and variables. It solves multiple-criteria decision-making problems by combining the entire range of performance attribute values being considered for every alternative into one single value. Thus, the main problem is reduced to a single-objective decision-making problem. In this study, we developed a decision support system for the evaluation of written exams with the help of GRA using contextual text mining techniques. The answers obtained from the written exam with the participation of 50 students in a computer laboratory and the answer key prepared by the instructor constituted the data set of the study. A symmetrical perspective allows us to perform relational analysis between the students\u2019 answers and the instructor\u2019s answer key in order to contribute to the measurement and evaluation. Text mining methods and GRA were applied to the data set through the decision support system employing the SQL Server database management system, C#, and Java programming languages. According to the results, we demonstrated that the exam papers are successfully ranked and graded based on the word similarities in the answer key.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/sym11111426","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2019,11,19]],"date-time":"2019-11-19T11:30:17Z","timestamp":1574163017000},"page":"1426","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":8,"title":["A Decision Support System Using Text Mining Based Grey Relational Method for the Evaluation of Written Exams"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"11","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-8976-9964","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Mehmet Erkan","family":"Yuksel","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Computer Engineering, Mehmet Akif Ersoy University, Burdur 15030, Turkey"}]},{"given":"Huseyin","family":"Fidan","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Industrial Engineering, Mehmet Akif Ersoy University, Burdur 15030, Turkey"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2019,11,19]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","unstructured":"Turgut, M.F., and Baykul, Y. (2012). E\u011fitimde \u00d6l\u00e7me ve De\u011ferlendirme, Pegem Akademi."},{"key":"ref_2","first-page":"13","article-title":"Assessment at a distance: Traditional vs. alternative assessments","volume":"2","author":"Dikli","year":"2003","journal-title":"Turk. Online J. Educ. Technol."},{"key":"ref_3","unstructured":"Y\u0131lmaz, A. (2009). \u00d6l\u00e7me ve De\u011ferlendirme, Pegem Akademi."},{"key":"ref_4","unstructured":"Miller, M.D., Linn, R.L., and Gronlund, N.E. (2013). Measurement and Assessment in Teaching, Pearson."},{"key":"ref_5","unstructured":"Fraenkel, J.R., and Wallen, N.E. (2005). How to Design and Evaluate Research in Education, McGraw-Hill."},{"key":"ref_6","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1","DOI":"10.1017\/S0269888906000737","article-title":"A survey of knowledge discovery and data mining process models","volume":"21","author":"Kurgan","year":"2006","journal-title":"Knowl. Eng. Rev."},{"key":"ref_7","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Kahraman, C., and Onar, S.C. (2015). Intelligent Techniques in Engineering Management, Theory and Applications, Springer.","DOI":"10.1007\/978-3-319-17906-3"},{"key":"ref_8","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"215","DOI":"10.1016\/j.apergo.2012.07.001","article-title":"Analysing factors related to slipping, stumbling, and falling accidents at work: Application of data mining methods to Finnish occupational accidents and diseases statistics database","volume":"44","author":"Nenonen","year":"2013","journal-title":"Appl. Ergon."},{"key":"ref_9","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"622","DOI":"10.1016\/j.knosys.2009.06.013","article-title":"Classification rule discovery for the aviation incidents resulted in fatality","volume":"22","author":"Gurbuz","year":"2009","journal-title":"Knowl. Based Syst."},{"key":"ref_10","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"30","DOI":"10.1016\/j.aei.2017.11.003","article-title":"Agent-based evacuation modeling with multiple exits using NeuroEvolution of Augmenting Topologies","volume":"35","author":"Yuksel","year":"2018","journal-title":"Adv. Eng. Inform."},{"key":"ref_11","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"465","DOI":"10.1007\/s12083-015-0397-0","article-title":"Mining students activities from a computer supported collaborative learning system based on peer to peer network","volume":"9","author":"Ji","year":"2016","journal-title":"Peer Peer Netw. Appl."},{"key":"ref_12","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Sailesh, S.B., Lu, K.J., and Aali, M.A. (2016, January 12\u201313). Profiling Students on Their Course-Taking Patterns in Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs). Proceedings of the International Conference on Information Science, Kochi, India.","DOI":"10.1109\/INFOSCI.2016.7845319"},{"key":"ref_13","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Scheuer, O., and McLaren, B.M. (2011). Educational Data Mining, In the Encyclopedia of the Sciences of Learning, Springer.","DOI":"10.1007\/978-1-4419-1428-6_618"},{"key":"ref_14","unstructured":"Tsai, C.Y., and Tsai, M.H. (2005, January 21\u201323). A Dynamic Web Service Based Data Mining Process System. Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Computer and Information Technology, Shanghai, China."},{"key":"ref_15","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"483","DOI":"10.1016\/S0160-791X(02)00038-6","article-title":"Data mining techniques for customer relationship management","volume":"24","author":"Rygielski","year":"2002","journal-title":"Technol. Soc."},{"key":"ref_16","unstructured":"Ramakrishnan, R., and Gehrke, J. (2003). Database Management Systems, McGraw-Hill Education."},{"key":"ref_17","unstructured":"Dunham, M.H. (2003). Data Mining: Introductory and Advanced Topics, Prentice-Hall."},{"key":"ref_18","first-page":"110","article-title":"Representation and classification of text documents: A brief review","volume":"2","author":"Harish","year":"2010","journal-title":"Int. J. Comput. Appl. Spec. Issue Recent Trends Image Process. Pattern Recognit."},{"key":"ref_19","unstructured":"Allahyari, M., Pouriyeh, S., Assefi, M., Safaei, S., Trippe, E.D., Gutierrez, J.B., and Kochut, K. (2017). A brief survey of text mining: Classification, clustering and extraction techniques. arXiv."},{"key":"ref_20","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Aggarwal, C., and Zhai, C. (2012). Transfer learning for text mining. Mining Text Data, Springer.","DOI":"10.1007\/978-1-4614-3223-4"},{"key":"ref_21","first-page":"85","article-title":"Text classification and classifiers: A survey","volume":"3","author":"Korde","year":"2012","journal-title":"Int. J. Artif. Intell. Appl."},{"key":"ref_22","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"413","DOI":"10.4304\/jsw.6.3.413-420","article-title":"An improvement to TF-IDF: Term distribution based term weight algorithm","volume":"6","author":"Xia","year":"2011","journal-title":"J. Softw."},{"key":"ref_23","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"4871","DOI":"10.1016\/j.eswa.2013.02.019","article-title":"Comparison of text feature selection policies and using an adaptive framework","volume":"40","author":"Tasci","year":"2013","journal-title":"Expert Syst. Appl."},{"key":"ref_24","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"245","DOI":"10.1016\/j.eswa.2016.09.009","article-title":"Turning from TF-IDF to TF-IGM for term weighting in text classification","volume":"66","author":"Chen","year":"2016","journal-title":"Expert Syst. Appl."},{"key":"ref_25","unstructured":"Cakan, M. (2008). E\u011fitimde \u00d6l\u00e7me ve De\u011ferlendirme, Pegem Akademi."},{"key":"ref_26","unstructured":"Atilgan, H., Kan, A., and Dogan, N. (2009). E\u011fitimde \u00d6l\u00e7me ve De\u011ferlendirme, Ani Yayincilik."},{"key":"ref_27","unstructured":"Stiggins, R. (2008). Assessment Manifesto: A Call for the Development of Balanced Assessment Systems, ETS Assessment Training Institute."},{"key":"ref_28","unstructured":"Gecit, Y. (2012). E\u011fitimde \u00d6l\u00e7me ve De\u011ferlendirme, Nobel Yayincilik."},{"key":"ref_29","unstructured":"Tekindal, S. (2014). Okullarda \u00d6l\u00e7me ve De\u011ferlendirme Y\u00f6ntemleri, Nobel Yayincilik."},{"key":"ref_30","unstructured":"Ozcelik, D.A. (2010). Okullarda \u00d6l\u00e7me ve De\u011ferlendirme \u00d6\u011fretmen El Kitab\u0131, Pegem Akademi."},{"key":"ref_31","unstructured":"Han, J., Kamber, M., and Pei, J. (2012). Data Mining Concepts and Techniques, Morgan Kaufmann."},{"key":"ref_32","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Witten, I.H., Frank, E., Hall, M.A., and Pal, C.J. (2017). Data Mining: Practical Machine Learning Tools and Techniques, Morgan Kaufmann.","DOI":"10.1016\/B978-0-12-804291-5.00010-6"},{"key":"ref_33","unstructured":"Ozkan, Y. (2016). Veri Madencili\u011fi Y\u00f6ntemleri, Papatya Bilim."},{"key":"ref_34","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"29","DOI":"10.1145\/2743025","article-title":"Trajectory data mining: An overview","volume":"6","author":"Zheng","year":"2015","journal-title":"ACM Trans. Intell. Syst. Technol."},{"key":"ref_35","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Berry, M.W. (2004). Survey of Text Mining: Clustering, Classification, and Retrieval, Springer.","DOI":"10.1007\/978-1-4757-4305-0"},{"key":"ref_36","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Diday, E., Lechevallier, Y., Schader, M., Bertrand, P., and Burtschy, B. (1994). Experiments of textual data analysis at Electricite de France. New Approaches in Classification and Data Analysis. Studies in Classification, Data Analysis, and Knowledge Organization, Springer.","DOI":"10.1007\/978-3-642-51175-2"},{"key":"ref_37","unstructured":"Feldman, R., and Dagan, I. (1995, January 20\u201321). Knowledge Discovery in Textual Databases. Proceedings of the First International Conference on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining, Montreal, QC, Canada."},{"key":"ref_38","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Weiss, S.M., Indurkhya, N., and Zhang, T. (2015). Fundamentals of Predictive Text Mining, Springer.","DOI":"10.1007\/978-1-4471-6750-1"},{"key":"ref_39","first-page":"1","article-title":"An overview of graph based keyword extraction methods and approaches","volume":"39","author":"Beliga","year":"2015","journal-title":"J. Inf. Organ. Sci."},{"key":"ref_40","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"879","DOI":"10.1016\/j.knosys.2008.03.044","article-title":"Text classification based on multi-word with support vector machine","volume":"21","author":"Zhang","year":"2008","journal-title":"Knowl. Based Syst."},{"key":"ref_41","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"14","DOI":"10.1016\/j.knosys.2015.06.015","article-title":"A survey on opinion mining and sentiment analysis: Tasks, approaches and applications","volume":"89","author":"Ravi","year":"2015","journal-title":"Knowl. Based Syst."},{"key":"ref_42","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"675","DOI":"10.1016\/j.dss.2012.05.022","article-title":"Subjectivity and sentiment analysis: An overview of the current state of the area and envisaged developments","volume":"53","author":"Montoyo","year":"2012","journal-title":"Decis. Support Syst."},{"key":"ref_43","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Aggarwal, C.C., and Zhai, C.X. (2012). Mining Test Data, Springer.","DOI":"10.1007\/978-1-4614-3223-4"},{"key":"ref_44","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Romero, C., Ventura, S., Pechenizkiy, M., and Baker, R.S. (2010). Handbook of Educational Data Mining, CRC Press, Taylor & Francis Group.","DOI":"10.1201\/b10274"},{"key":"ref_45","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"78","DOI":"10.1109\/MIS.2014.42","article-title":"Educational data mining: An advance for intelligent systems in education","volume":"29","author":"Baker","year":"2014","journal-title":"IEEE Intell. Syst."},{"key":"ref_46","unstructured":"Liu, S., and Lin, Y. (2006). Grey Information Theory and Practical Applications, Springer."},{"key":"ref_47","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"288","DOI":"10.1016\/S0167-6911(82)80025-X","article-title":"Control problems of grey systems","volume":"1","author":"Deng","year":"1982","journal-title":"Syst. Control Lett."},{"key":"ref_48","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"89","DOI":"10.1108\/20439371211260081","article-title":"A brief introduction to grey systems theory","volume":"2","author":"Liu","year":"2012","journal-title":"Grey Syst. Theory Appl."},{"key":"ref_49","unstructured":"Yildirim, B.F., and Onder, E. (2015). Gri ili\u015fkisel analiz. \u00c7ok Kriterli Karar Verme Y\u00f6ntemleri, Dora Yayincilik."},{"key":"ref_50","unstructured":"Kumar, G.D. (2019). Association rules-based grey relational approach for e-commerce recommender system. Machine Learning Techniques for Improved Business Analytics, IGI Global."},{"key":"ref_51","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"48","DOI":"10.4067\/S0718-18762020000100105","article-title":"Grey relational classification of consumers\u2019 textual evaluations in e-commerce","volume":"15","author":"Fidan","year":"2020","journal-title":"J. Theor. Appl. Electron. Commer. Res."},{"key":"ref_52","first-page":"163","article-title":"Grey relational clustering analysis of e-commerce customers loyalty","volume":"9","author":"Fidan","year":"2018","journal-title":"Online Acad. J. Inf. Technol."},{"key":"ref_53","unstructured":"Ertugrul, I., Oztas, T., Ozcil, A., and Oztas, G.Z. (2016). Grey relational analysis approach in academic performance comparison of university: A case study of Turkish universities. Eur. Sci. J., 128\u2013139."},{"key":"ref_54","first-page":"45","article-title":"Applying grey relational analysis to the vendor evaluation model","volume":"11","author":"Tsai","year":"2003","journal-title":"Int. J. Comput. Internet Manag."},{"key":"ref_55","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"141","DOI":"10.1613\/jair.2934","article-title":"From frequency to meaning: Vector space models of semantics","volume":"37","author":"Turney","year":"2010","journal-title":"J. Artif. Intell. Res."},{"key":"ref_56","unstructured":"Elmer, P.D. (2012). Term weighting for information retrieval using fuzzy logic. Fuzzy Logic-Algorithms, Techniques and Implementations, Intech."}],"container-title":["Symmetry"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2073-8994\/11\/11\/1426\/pdf","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,11]],"date-time":"2025-10-11T13:35:38Z","timestamp":1760189738000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2073-8994\/11\/11\/1426"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2019,11,19]]},"references-count":56,"journal-issue":{"issue":"11","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2019,11]]}},"alternative-id":["sym11111426"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/sym11111426","relation":{},"ISSN":["2073-8994"],"issn-type":[{"value":"2073-8994","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2019,11,19]]}}}