What Makes a Concept Complex? Measuring Conceptual Complexity as a Precursor for Text Simplification

Anne Eschenbruecher


Abstract
Advancements within the field of text simplification (TS) have primarily been within syntactic or lexical simplification. However, conceptual simplification has previously been identified as another field of TS that has the potential to significantly improve reading comprehension. A first step to measuring conceptual simplification is the classification of concepts as either complex or simple. This research-in-progress paper proposes a new definition of conceptual complexity alongside a simple machine-learning approach that performs a binary classification task to distinguish between simple and complex concepts. It is proposed that this be a first step when developing new text simplification models that operate on a conceptual level.
Anthology ID:
2021.triton-1.17
Volume:
Proceedings of the Translation and Interpreting Technology Online Conference
Month:
July
Year:
2021
Address:
Held Online
Editors:
Ruslan Mitkov, Vilelmini Sosoni, Julie Christine Giguère, Elena Murgolo, Elizabeth Deysel
Venue:
TRITON
SIG:
Publisher:
INCOMA Ltd.
Note:
Pages:
154–160
Language:
URL:
https://aclanthology.org/2021.triton-1.17
DOI:
Bibkey:
Cite (ACL):
Anne Eschenbruecher. 2021. What Makes a Concept Complex? Measuring Conceptual Complexity as a Precursor for Text Simplification. In Proceedings of the Translation and Interpreting Technology Online Conference, pages 154–160, Held Online. INCOMA Ltd..
Cite (Informal):
What Makes a Concept Complex? Measuring Conceptual Complexity as a Precursor for Text Simplification (Eschenbruecher, TRITON 2021)
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PDF:
https://aclanthology.org/2021.triton-1.17.pdf