Ordinal regression based on learning vector quantization

Recently, ordinal regression, which predicts categories of ordinal scale, has received considerable attention. In this paper, we propose a new approach to solve ordinal regression problems within the learning vector quantization framework. It extends the previous approach termed ordinal generalized matrix learning vector quantization with a more suitable and natural cost function, leading to more intuitive parameter update rules. Moreover, in our approach the bandwidth of the prototype weights is automatically adapted. Empirical investigation on a number of datasets reveals that overall the proposed approach tends to have superior out-of-sample performance, when compared to alternative ordinal regression methods.