Skip to contentScholarGate
LibraryBookshelfDeskReview StudioAssistant
Sign in
Gower Distance/Evidence
Method evidence record

Gower Distance

Gower distance is a versatile metric for comparing observations with mixed variable types (continuous, ordinal, categorical, and binary). Introduced by John C. Gower in 1971, this similarity coefficient computes a general measure that ranges from 0 (completely dissimilar) to 1 (identical). It automatically scales variables to a common unit and handles missing values gracefully, making it ideal for clustering and classification on heterogeneous datasets.

Sources recorded, not reviewed

Source record

Citations copied verbatim from the method’s source record. No claim-level verification is inferred from them.

Gower Distance Metric
Taxonomic method record · mcdm / decision-making
  • Gower, J. C. (1971). A general coefficient of similarity and some of its properties. Biometrics, 27(4), 857-874. · DOI 10.2307/2528823
  • Gower, J. C. (1985). Properties of Euclidean and non-Euclidean distance matrices. Linear Algebra and its Applications, 67, 81-97. · DOI 10.1016/0024-3795(85)90187-9
Open full method

Curated claims

Claims persisted in the evidence ledger, each with its own assessment.

No curated claims yet

This view does not invent a claim assessment when the ledger has none.

Related methods

Generated from the method graph and shown as machine-suggested relations — no evidence claim is inferred.

No related methods yet

The generated relation graph has no outgoing relation for this method.

Evidence status

Sources recorded, not reviewed

Bibliographic sources are present. Claim-level evidence review has not been performed.

Sources

2 recorded citations, copied from the method source record.

Actions

Open method page
ScholarGate

A content-first reference library for research methods — what each one is, how it works, and where it comes from.

Open data (CC-BY)

Explore

  • Library
  • Search the library…
  • Browse by field
  • Fields
  • Journey
  • Compare
  • Which method?

Reference

  • Subjects
  • Atlas
  • Glossary
  • Methodology
  • Philosophy

Your tools

  • Bookshelf
  • Desk
  • Chat

Company

  • About
  • Pricing
  • Contact
  • Suggest a method

Entries are compiled from published sources for reference. Verifying the accuracy and suitability of any information for your own use remains your responsibility.

© 2026 ScholarGate · A research-method reference library
  • Privacy
  • Cookies
  • Terms
  • Delete account