A rough set approach to analyze factors affecting landslide incidence

Abstract

Landslide incidence can be affected by a variety of environmental factors. Past studies have focused on the identification of these environmental factors, but most are based on statistical analysis. In this paper, spatial information techniques were applied to a case study of landslide occurrence in China by combining remote sensing and geographical information systems with an innovative data mining approach (rough set theory) and statistical analyses. Core and reducts of data attributes were obtained by data mining based on rough set theory. Rules for the impact factors, which can contribute to landslide occurrence, were generated from the landslide knowledge database. It was found that all 11 rules can be classified as both exact and approximate rules. In terms of importance, three main rules were then extracted as the key decision-making rules for landslide predictions. Meanwhile, the relationship between landslide occurrence and environmental factors was statistically analyzed to validate the accuracy of rules extracted by the rough set-based method. It was shown that the rough set-based approach is of use in analyzing environmental factors affecting landslide occurrence, and thus facilitates the decision-making process for landslide prediction.