Overlapping clusters

Overlapping clusters occur when data points share characteristics that place them into multiple groups simultaneously. Imagine sorting books into categories, but some books fit into more than one category, like "Science" and "History." In data analysis, this means that a single data point can belong to more than one cluster because it has features relevant to each group. Overlapping clusters reflect real-world complexity, where categories are not always perfectly separate, allowing for a more nuanced understanding of how data points relate to different patterns or groups.