Improving database design through the analysis of relationships

Much of the work on conceptual modeling involves the use of an entity-relat ionship model in which binary relationships appear as associations between two entities. Relationships involving more than two entities are considered rare and, therefore, have not received adequate attention. This research p rovides a general framework for the analysis of relationships in which bina ry relationships simply become a special case. The framework helps a design er to identify ternary and other higher-degree relationships that are commo nly represented, often inappropriately, as either entities or binary relati onships. Generalized rules are also provided for representing higher-degree relationships in the relational model. This uniform treatment of relations hips should significantly ease the burden on a designer by enabling him or her to extract more information from a real-world situation and represent i t properly in a conceptual design.