A4 Refereed article in a conference publication

TextSimplifier : A Modular, Extensible, and Context Sensitive Simplification Framework for Improved Natural Language Understanding




AuthorsSeneviratne Sandaru, Daskalaki Elena, Suominen Hanna

EditorsŠtajner Sanja, Saggio Horacio, Shardlow Matthew, Alva-Manchego Fernando

Conference nameWorkshop on Text Simplification, Accessibility and Readability

PublisherIncoma Ltd

Publishing placeShoumen

Publication year2023

Book title TSAR 2023 : Proceedings of the 2nd edition of the Workshop on Text Simplification, Accessibility and Readability - associated with The 14th International Conference on Recent Advances in Natural Language Processing’2023

Journal name in sourceTSAR 2023 - 2nd Workshop on Text Simplification, Accessibility and Readability, associated with the 14th International Conference on Recent Advances in Natural Language Processing 2023, RANLP 2023 - Proceedings of the Workshop

First page 21

Last page32

ISBN978-954-452-086-1

DOIhttps://doi.org/10.26615/978-954-452-086-1_003

Web address https://aclanthology.org/2023.tsar-1.3

Self-archived copy’s web addresshttps://research.utu.fi/converis/portal/detail/Publication/387499458


Abstract
Natural language understanding is fundamental to knowledge acquisition in today's information society. However, natural language is often ambiguous with frequent occurrences of complex terms, acronyms, and abbreviations that require substitution and disambiguation, for example, by “translation” from complex to simpler text for better understanding. These tasks are usually difficult for people with limited reading skills, second language learners, and non-native speakers. Hence, the development of text simplification systems that are capable of simplifying complex text is of paramount importance. Thus, we conducted a user study to identify which components are essential in a text simplification system. Based on our findings, we proposed an improved text simplification framework, covering a broader range of aspects related to lexical simplification - from complexity identification to lexical substitution and disambiguation - while supplementing the simplified outputs with additional information for better understandability. Based on the improved framework, we developed TextSimplifier, a modularised, context-sensitive, end-to-end simplification framework, and engineered its web implementation. This system targets lexical simplification that identifies complex terms and acronyms followed by their simplification through substitution and disambiguation for better understanding of complex language.

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Last updated on 2025-30-01 at 11:41