A determination is made of an explanatory variable with respect to an objective variable. A subset of data from data to be analyzed is created, in response to setting the objective variable to be analyzed to perform analysis. Association analysis is applied to analysis results, in response to a number of analysis runs exceeding a predetermined number. An association rule is derived for the explanatory variable from a result of the association analysis. An explanatory variable having a relevance value greater than a threshold value with the objective variable in the data to be analyzed is selected. The selected explanatory variable is scored as an input using the association rule to determine whether the explanatory variable is to be added or removed.