Linguistic resources and fuzzy algebra in adaptive hypermedia systems

In this paper we formalize the representation and management of fuzzy hypermedia, linguistic resource and psycho-cognitive profile of the user by describing a consistent fuzzy-based approach to user profiling. Our model uses a correspondence between the content of information in the hypermedia domain and representation of the users. The stereotype users and the real users are represented by type-2 fuzzy sets. The domain of the latter is the set of nodes of the hypertext whereas the range are the terms of a t-uple of linguistic variables used in the definition of the users’s features. Keeping in mind the initial representation of the user, the current state and the choices done by him/her during the navigation in the hypermedia, the user model dynamically updates the representation of the real users, realizing full adaptivity with respect both to the presentation and to the navigation. The adaptivity function is constructed by means of a commutative monoid, whose support set is just the set of stereotypes.