DISTATIS: The Analysis of Multiple Distance Matrices

In this paper we present a generalization of classical multidimensional scaling called DISTATIS which is a new method that can be used to compare algorithms when their outputs consist of distance matrices computed on the same set of objects. The method first evaluates the similarity between algorithms using a coefficient called the RV coefficient. From this analysis, a compromise matrix is computed which represents the best aggregate of the original matrices. In order to evaluate the differences between algorithms, the original distance matrices are then projected onto the compromise. We illustrate this method with a "toy example" in which four different "algorithms" (two computer programs and two sets of human observers) evaluate the similarity among faces.