Analyzing Cultural Biases through the ‘Reverse Clustering’ Approach: The Reality and the Interpretation

Abstract

The paper is devoted to a specific analysis of data, originating from a sample of opinions collected from the university students, concerning their learning experiences and the use of modern IT enabled media. The analysis is performed using the ‘reverse clustering’ approach. We are primarily interested in this paper in the differentiation of the opinions along the lines of the potential cultural backgrounds, extending our previous investigations of this matter. This is of very high importance from the perspective of the potential use of such opinions in the attempts of crowdsourcing or similar use of the web-based collection of concepts and ideas. In the present paper we treat the aspects of results, provided by the ‘reverse clustering’ approach, with main emphasis on the role of specific variables in shaping of the apparent cultural divides in the sets of opinions. Thus, both the nature of these divides is assessed and the potential use of the reverse clustering is evaluated.