Concept mapping through a hub: coli-conc pilot study

Concept mapping through a hub is based on expressing each concept from any participating KOS through a description logic (DL) formula, a combination of elemental concepts drawn from a common classification of elemental concepts (such as a faceted classification). Complex DL formulas also give the role of each elemental concept in the compound. The resulting DL formulas are assembled in the hub; reasoning over DL formulas discovers concept relationships within and between KOS, including concept mappings. DL formulas are linked to concepts from participating KOS. KOS concepts linked to the same DL formula are mapped as skos:exactMatch. (Other types of SKOS mappings can be inferred from the relationships between DL formulas). Coli-conc is an integrated system for the collection, management, and mapping of KOS; it stores individual KOS and the mappings between KOS imported from various sources or created in Coli-conc with computer assistance. We will report on an exploratory qualitative study comparing mappings created through a hub with mappings available in Coli-conc. We drew a list of 50 examples for which Col-conc has three pairs of mappings {DDC — RVK, DDC — GND, RVK — GND} from the subject areas Psychology, Law, Education, Transportation, and Medicine. For each of the involved classes/ subject headings we created a simple DL formula. In the process we built an ad-hoc hierarchical list of elemental concepts. We will report observations and conclusions from inspecting the results, comparing the mappings based on DL formulas with the mappings given in Coli- conc.