Patent ID: 8572019

Claim:
A computer-readable storage device whose contents cause a computing system to perform a method for adjusting with respect to a plurality of attributes each having a plurality of possible values a set of survey responses each from a survey respondent and each specifying an answer to each of one or more survey questions, the method comprising: for each of the survey respondents, accessing a value for each of the plurality of attributes; for each of the plurality of members of a modeled population, accessing a value for each of the plurality of attributes; initializing a decision tree to contain a single node that is both a root node and a leaf node; completing the initialized decision tree by adding interior nodes to the decision tree that each reduce the total dissimilarity measure between the reference and subject data sets by specifying a partitioning of the possible values of one of the plurality of attributes, wherein the dissimilarity measure of each leaf node is determined based on the level of dissimilarity of the attribute values of the survey respondents whose attribute values satisfy any partitionings specified by interior nodes on the path from the root node to the leaf node with the attribute values of the members of the modeled population whose attribute values satisfy any partitionings specified by interior nodes on the path from the root node to the leaf node; for each of the leaf nodes in the completed decision tree: identifying any members of the modeled population whose attribute values satisfy the partitionings specified by the path within the tree from its root node to the leaf node, identifying any survey respondents whose attribute values satisfy the partitionings specified by the interior nodes on the path from the root node to the leaf node, and determining a ratio of the number or proportion of members of the modeled population identified for the leaf node to a number of survey respondents identified for the leaf node; for each of the survey responses, adjusting each answer to a survey question specified by the survey response by a factor based upon the ratio determined for the leaf node for which the survey respondent from whom the survey response was received was identified.